The Butterfly
by Tea Leaf
Summary: Life is never easy but for some, its worse than others. Broken and being poisoned from the inside, Sakura has become the butterfly floating on the edges of reality. [complete, MF]
1. Introspection by Moonlight

Disclaimer: nope, I don't own Naruto the series or any of the characters. 

A/N: Well, this idea has just been burning my brain for a while now and I just had to write it out. I'm not sure if I should leave it as a one-shot introspective or if I should add to it and make it an actual story. So read it and let me know what you think in a review. Please and thank you! Oh yeah, This fic will contain spoilers up until chapter 212 on the manga.

~~~

The Butterfly

By: Tea Leaf/Banana Soap

~~~

The door slowly crept open, pushed from the outside. There was a subtle jangling of keys as they were removed from the lock and held loosely in her palm. She stepped in slowly, into the dark studio apartment and tossed the keys on the plain and bare kitchen table. She lived alone now but she'd felt alone since she was twelve. She stared at the keys glistening slightly in the cold moonlight that filtered in through the gauzy curtains covering the bay window.

She closed her eyes and closed the door, throwing the padlock, and rested against the cold wood for a moment. She was exhausted. She was always exhausted but she just couldn't manage to sleep. Insomnia plagued her. 

So she stayed out late every night, just wasting the hours in some smoky bar with a barely touched drink warming in front of her. Then, when the bar closed, she came back her, back to this cold and barren room. 

It was sparsely furnished, there was a table with a chair in the "kitchen" corner of the room, there were curtains on the window, there were a few thread bare white towels in the bathroom, a bed with plain black sheets and comforter (though it never was very comforting) was immaculately made, she couldn't remember the last time she'd slept in it, and then there was a stereo. She walked over to it and pressed the power button followed with "random" and then "play". Haunting cords from an acoustic guitar flowed from the speaker.

As was said, she was alone. She had once had parents but they had died a few years earlier during a second invasion by Orochimaru. His last invasion. 

But she had been alone before they died. 

It had been night, dark. She had waited; her heart in her throat, silently praying that the confrontation she felt coming wasn't going to happen, not tonight at least. She's been disappointed. He hadn't expected her and was annoyed with her presence, as he always was. She'd poured her heart out to him, done her best to convince him to stay. She'd cried…she hated herself now for it. He'd left anyway.

She shook her head slightly, clearing the memories and walked to the window, sitting in the bay seat, hiding from the empty apartment behind her gauzy gray curtains and opened the window. The cold air flowed in, numbing her skin, as her heart was numb, as her soul was numb, as her mind was numb, as her eyes were numb. 

Naruto had gone after him, she had tried to hope he would succeed but deep down, she knew it really didn't matter if he did. He would never be the same. She would never be the same. 

Naruto had failed, as she knew he would. Neji, Kiba and Choji had been critically injured and were in intensive care for weeks after. Everyone had returned injured but they had also returned with new allies. The sand siblings had come to their aid, the only reason any came back alive. She'd been happy for them, especially for Gaara, he'd begun his path to recovery. 

She hadn't cried when they returned, she hadn't cried since they left. She'd been drained, she was still drained. So she when on mechanically, with a dark shadow hanging over her, the dark shadow that now filled her room. She'd gone on training, her sensei and teammate having enough tact not to comment on her strange behavior. She was pretty sure they pitied her. She was pretty sure they still did. She hated pity.

She'd gotten stronger, but not from any help from them. They treated her like some fragile glass doll that would shatter at the slighted touch. 

She slowly unbound the strips of black material that covered her left forearm, the one facing the open window. There were several scars and fresh slice wounds spreading like cobwebs across her pale skin. With her right hand she pulled a kunai out of the pouch near the small of her back and pressed it to the injured flesh. Red oozed forward, glowing faintly in the moonlight. See, she wasn't glass, she was flesh. Far more fragile. She stared at the blood trickling down her arm. She couldn't feel it. She couldn't feel anything. She was numb. Suddenly she glared at her arm and in a sudden fit of rage, she sliced viciously at her arm, reopening the old wounds and creating more. Then, just as suddenly as it had come, the emotion attempting to spark in her eyes fizzled out, leaving just the cold numbness. She sighed inaudibly and dropped her arm, letting it dangle out the open window. The blood flowed in rivulets down her arm, over her wrist, pooling slightly in her lightly curved palm before dripping off her fingertips to crash in the alley below.

Unconsciously the bloody hand formed a seal, her lips moved slightly but no sound came out. Slowly the small, summoned black and crimson butterfly fluttered its way up to her, perching on her raised knee and looking at her questioningly. The numb green eyes stared at it as her cold, uninjured hand rose to stroke the poisonous wings. 

She remembered the first time she had made the blood pact with the butterfly. She'd been barely thirteen; he had left four months ago. Naruto and Kakashi had been doing some one on one training, leaving her to her own devices. She had wandered off into the woods surrounding the village. She'd found a small clearing that was heavily shaded in what had been the near twilight hours. As the sun descended, small black and red butterflies had risen from the surrounding wood. She had sat down and contemplated. 

She was like a butterfly. 

Small, fragile, insubstantial. Just a pretty thing that people liked to look at in a superficial way, that was discarded as soon as something more interesting came along, and everything was more interesting. The realization had fed the void inside her and she'd been desperate to prove that she really was a human. That was the first time she'd sliced her arm for the confirming blood. She'd been horrified with herself but the butterflies had come to her. They'd landed on all parts of her body; one of them landed in the blood and had looked at her. Then it had licked the blood.

Kakashi had shown up then, terrified for her safety. Apparently those butterflies were highly poisonous. She'd started to feel the effects then. She'd turned drowsy, her heart slowed, her breathing became labored. Naruto had panicked. Kakashi rushed her to the hospital. She'd fallen asleep. When she woke up, The 5th Hokage, Tsunade, had been there and told her that she was very lucky. Apparently she had a natural immunity to the poison. 

She'd known better.

She'd trained, learned she could summon the butterflies, learned that the butterflies had different levels of poison. Some had sleep powders, others paralyzed, others still killed. She also learned that because the butterflies were so small, she could share her body with them with a customized summoning jutsu. When she did this, her skin become poisonous, just like the butterfly.

Her finger still idly stroked the crimson and black wing. She still hadn't mastered growing wings when she joined with the insect. 

Three years after leaving, he'd returned. He'd trained with and used the curse seal to finally avenge his family and had destroyed his brother. He'd now had no reason to live and had been perfectly happy to hand his body over to Orochimaru. Orochimaru had wanted to have him help in the annihilation of the village before he took his body. They had attacked.

And that's when his plan had become clear. He'd been lying to Orochimaru and now, finally back in his home village, he'd returned to the ranks of the Leaf shinobi. She'd been so relieved. She still loved him. 

Stupid girl, her modern self condemned.

Orochimaru had turned on him, intent to kill. She had rushed in. She refused to allow him to be hurt again if she could do something to stop it. He'd been surprised. She'd defended him as best she could, using every new skill in her arsenal, surprising everyone when she summoned the butterflies for the first time in front of them. Orochimaru had been slightly stunned at this, it had been a small opening but enough of an opening. Tsunade-sama had jumped in and decapitated him before he could react. 

The curse seal had disappeared with Orochimaru. He had gone into heavy withdrawal. She'd tried to help as best she could but she'd come to the harsh reality that her new abilities were all destructive, she could not help. 

She was poison.

Slowly, things had fallen back into their normal routine. After his excruciating rehabilitation, he and Naruto had become rivals again, constantly pushing each other forward. Kakashi-sensei had become preoccupied with training them. She'd been left forgotten in the background, forever the butterfly. 

She'd tried for a while to return to some semblance of living but she'd failed. Every time she tried to help, she just seemed to make things worse. She felt like a pariah. Although she advanced in levels with them, and now found herself a jounin, Naruto had joined a group specializing in the development of new jutsu. He had joined ANBU. 

She was still left behind. 

And now here she was, alone in this cold darkness. The only one not actually moving forward of their own momentum. The only one still broken. The only one with no goals, no purpose. 

She stroked the butterfly's wing. 

She was the butterfly simply swaying with the wind. 

A single tear, shining in the cold moonlight, slipped down her left cheek.


	2. Night Fades Into Day, The Beat Goes On

Disclaimer: Still don't own Naruto. A/N: Well...I got one review (thank you so much Kashshaptu!) and that review said I should continue. Seeing as I had nothing to do and really felt like writing, I decided that writing for one person is enough. So here we have chapter 2 of The Butterfly. I'm not really sure where the fic is going yet...guess we'll find out as I write. As for pairings...I dunno yet. I can tell you it will be het though and will involve Sakura. Not that I've anything against yuri and yaoi, I've just absolutely no talent for writing it ^^(). So yeah, here's chapter 2, please review, let me know what you think and let me know if you've got any ideas, I'm always open to suggestion and will credit the idea to you. Oh also, this chapter is very slowly paced...the whole fic will probably be that way; I find that a lazy and broken storytelling conveys my words best for this story. Hope you enjoy!  
  
~~~  
  
The Butterfly: Chapter 2 By: Tea Leaf/Banana Soap  
  
~~~  
  
The blood dried, flaking off her arm slightly. Listless eyes stared out the window, over the alley, over the shorter building beside hers, past the walls, past the forest, out to the horizon. She hadn't moved for hours but she was only vaguely aware of that. She hadn't slept; she was simply in that hazy place between alertness and sleep. The sky was beginning to lighten; the moon had set a while ago. The stars were slowly being snuffed out, one by one.  
  
Still a cold finger vaguely stroked the black and crimson wing. The butterfly watched her. She felt so small, so helpless. She'd been with her mistress for six years now, ever since as a broken child she had wandered into their field. The butterflies had loved her. They'd felt a bond with her. They, like so many others who have known her, had sworn to protect her with their lives. The butterfly suspected that that was one of the reasons she had steadily grown further and further away from them, further and further into her own shell.  
  
The girl sighed as the sun started to peek over the horizon and the sky took on a multitude of colors.  
  
She lifted the butterfly from her knee and stood. The butterfly took off and disappeared out the window, blending into the sunrise. She watched as it left, watching its back, a part of anatomy that was all too familiar to her eyes.  
  
"I live my life trapped in the endless sunset. My world is neither light nor dark, it is merely fading from one extreme to the other." She muttered in a voice that had become husky from lack of use. She didn't have much to say anymore.  
  
She wandered to the bathroom and stripped off the previous days clothes before turning on the water. As she waited for it to heat she took a look at her reflection in the mirror over the sink.  
  
Her hair had grown out again; she had just never gotten around to cutting it again. It now brushed the tops of her thighs. The color had faded; it was still pink of course but not nearly as lustrous. She certainly wouldn't be accused of being a "sexy shinobi" now; she mused with a slightly arched eyebrow. She was thin, if she moved or stretched her upper body in any way, her ribs and spine became visible. Her hips had rounded out with age but her hipbones were still sharp and prominent. Her breasts had grown as well, larger than she had expected them to but no one aside from her knew that, she kept them tightly bound all the time to keep them from interfering with her movement in combat and training. There were angry red chaff marks marring her skin but she liked them, if she rubbed the marks hard enough, pain finally crept through her system, and feeling pain was better than feeling nothing. Her body was lean but heavily muscled; she trained her body almost brutally every day in hopes of expending enough energy so as to pass out from exhaustion.  
  
She wasn't so lucky.  
  
What she liked the most about her body though where the things everyone else thought to be flaws.  
  
She loved her scars.  
  
She ran her hand over a thick one near her right hipbone. That was where Orochimaru had stabbed her with a kunai three years ago. She'd ripped it out and thrown it right back at him, stabbing him in the same spot.  
  
It was one of her favorite scars.  
  
Steam started to rise from the water and she turned towards it. But as she did, she noticed another favorite wound on her back. Between her shoulder blades were three jagged scars about two inches in length each, shirukens had given her those.  
  
She loved those scars; they were a reminder that she really wasn't as clever as she once had thought she was.  
  
She climbed into the shower pulling the tab that moved the water from the faucet to the showerhead, eyes closing as the scalding water hit her like drops of fire, searing her skin. She turned, letting the water soak her hair before reaching for the soap and scrubbing viciously at her skin.  
  
The wounds on her arm opened again and the soap stung.  
  
She ignored it.  
  
~~~  
  
Rock Lee walked quickly through the streets of Konoha. He knew she would be awake, he usually saw her already training in the fields when he woke up. Today he was going to ask her to train with him.  
  
He'd been doing this about once a week for the past few years. He kept hoping that maybe if someone treated her like an equal again she might start to come out of the apathetic shell she lived in.  
  
The fact that he fantasized her falling madly in love with him over one of these training sessions and magically re-becoming the bright and energetic girl with her heart perpetually on her sleeve and the most incredible devotion in heart, was entirely beside the point.  
  
Deep down, he thought he might know what was wrong with her. She had some wound, that even she wouldn't admit to having, that was still wide-open and festering. The infection was affecting her in every possible way.  
  
He'd asked Neji once if he knew how to heal that kind of wound. He'd hoped Neji would know because he could always read people so well. He'd been told that there was no way for someone on the outside to heal it. The person with the wound had to heal it himself.  
  
Gaara had been there and disagreed. Gaara said that the only way he'd been able to heal had been with the help of others. Neji had pointed out that the difference between Gaara and Sakura's situations was that Gaara had actually wanted to heal. He hadn't been so sure that Sakura did.  
  
Lee had sighed and decided to try anyway. So far he'd had no luck.  
  
~~~  
  
She stood in the shower. She had finished washing quite some time ago but she didn't want to move.  
  
She liked the heat.  
  
She always felt so cold and nothing could really drive it from her. If she were honest with herself, she'd admit that the hot water didn't really warm her at all; it just distracted her.  
  
Slowly the water started to cool and she closed her eyes in resignation as a long fingered hand rose and turned of the water. She stepped out of the shower and dried off with a threadbare towel. She really should get some new ones but she just didn't care enough to bother. She hung the towel back on the rack and walked naked to her bed; there were dressers underneath where she kept her meager wardrobe. She pulled out a pair of underwear and black pants as well as some fresh rolls of gauze. She dressed her lower body and held the corner of a roll of gauze to her rib cage before proceeding to bind her ribs and breasts painfully tight. She then wrapped her forearms with two rolls of black gauze. That way if they bled, the blood would be hidden in the black. As for the long strands of wet hair, she simply twisted them into a messy knot and the back of her head, securing it with an elastic.  
  
A knock sounded lightly at the door as she finished.  
  
She merely raised her eyes at the offending sound.  
  
"Sakura-san?" questioned a now deeper but still childishly eager voice.  
  
She closed her eyes briefly before walking over to the door, throwing open the lock and opening the door.  
  
Lee stood there, dressed as he had always dressed in the green body suit with his forehead protector worn as a belt and bright orange ribbed leg warmers. The only difference was now he wore the jounin vest, just like Gai- sensei.  
  
She lifted a brow questioningly.  
  
"Sakura-san!" Lee exclaimed with a grin, dimmed slightly by her impassive and disconnected expression.  
  
"I was wondering if you would like to train with me today?" he questioned hopefully.  
  
She looked away for a moment, considering, the shrugged and opened the door wider so that he could enter.  
  
As he walked past her she observed the changes time had made to him. He was taller, about 5'11" she guessed. He was built the same though, still thin and lean and his muscles were still very well developed, she could see them shifting beneath his clothes.  
  
She closed the door and walked back to the bed, crouching to the drawers to find a shirt. She found a black mesh one and pulled it on then walked over to the door and pulled on her sandals and grabbed her shirukens holster to strap to her right leg and her kunai pouch which she threaded on her forehead protector which she used as a belt and passed it through the loops of her pants.  
  
"Let's go." She said monotonously.  
  
Lee nodded and bounced up from her kitchen chair before heading out the door. She snatched her keys off the table and followed, locking the door behind her.  
  
~~~  
  
He slowly made his way back to the village. He'd had an assassination mission and had been away for the past week and now, finally, he could come home.  
  
It had taken a lot for him to be able to call this place home but now that he could he was fiercely protective of it. Nothing was going to take his home away from him again. Not now that he could protect it.  
  
To be honest, he wasn't sure what it was that made this place home. He knew what it had once been, it had once been home because of his family, but his family had been murdered and home had been ripped away. Then it was home because of what he had come to think of as his surrogate family but he hadn't been able to enjoy it then because he still hadn't avenged his family. Once that had been done, he had not hesitated in returning and finally appreciating his surrogate family and enjoying his home again.  
  
But something had been off. Something was still off. His surrogate family had changed while he was away and he still didn't really understand or accept the changes. He ignored them, acted as he always had and deluded himself that the others acted the same as well.  
  
The gates came into view and he sighed with relief. He made his way towards it, exchanged passwords with the guards and was admitted. He hobbled along the street soon coming to the bridge that was so very familiar to him. As a child this had been more home than his house, this is where he always met with his surrogate family.  
  
But they weren't here to meet him. They never met here anymore. He could barely remember the last time they had.  
  
He heard a large snap coming from the clearing that was just behind the tree line on his side of the bridge, the clearing where the hero monument was.  
  
Curiosity came over him then. He had found that now that he didn't have the responsibilities to the past weighing him down anymore, he really did enjoy indulging his curiosity so he wandered over.  
  
~~~  
  
Lee ducked as Sakura came at him with a flying kick. The kick hit the tree behind him and with a large snap, the wood gave and the tree toppled over.  
  
Lee's eyes widened slightly at the power. That would have hurt...  
  
In the meantime, Sakura had recovered from the kick and was attacking again.  
  
She came in with a punch that Lee blocked, then another from the other side that Lee blocked again, she then brought up her leg to kick him in the ribs but he dodged and backed up a few steps.  
  
Sakura flipped onto her hands, her legs came up and locked around Lee's neck with her calves. She then reversed her motion and pulled Lee off his feet and set him flying into the debris of the broken tree as she landed on her feet and stood again, moving into a defensive position.  
  
"You're holding back." she stated coldly.  
  
Lee groaned, fighting Sakura seemed to keep getting harder and harder over the years. He couldn't really fight back because he really didn't want to hurt her but he knew she'd be hurt if she found out. So Lee looked for a way to change the subject. That's when he spotted his "get out of jail free" card.  
  
"Ah, Sasuke-san! What are you doing here?" He asked brightly as he slowly stood up from the broken wood.  
  
Sakura dropped her defensive pose and rose to stand normally. The sparing was over.  
  
"I was just investigating that crash." He responded with disinterest as he lent Lee a hand to rise while watching Sakura out of the corner of his eye.  
  
Sakura held his eyes for a second with cold detachment before looking away. She turned and left the clearing without a word.  
  
Lee noticed and shouted goodbye to her, she raised her hand slightly in a half-hearted wave.  
  
Lee sighed dejectedly. Another day, another failure.  
  
"What happened to the tree?" Sasuke asked Lee, ignoring the fact that Sakura had completely ignored him.  
  
"Sakura kicked it. She'd been aiming for my head..." he responded with apprehension. "Good thing I ducked, eh?" he continued with a grin.  
  
Sasuke smirked slightly.  
  
"Yeah, good thing."  
  
~~~  
  
Sakura walked through the woods, soon coming to the field where she'd met the butterflies what seemed like a lifetime ago.  
  
She collapsed under a tree, her right hand rising to rub her chest over her heart.  
  
She hated seeing him. She loved seeing him. It hurt to see him.  
  
He'd looked good...he always looked good though, didn't he? The dark hair that hid his face, shadowed it with mystery. Those dark eyes...bedroom eyes. Those features that had been beautiful as a boy that had matured to breathtakingly handsome as a man. He was at least 6 feet tall now and had filled out perfectly, with perfectly sculpted muscles. He was an artist's dream model.  
  
Her fingernails on her left hand dug into her palm so hard they drew blood.  
  
She lifted her head, staring off through the leafy canopy above her to the blue sky as she bit her lip.  
  
She'd finally managed to not think about him. As long as she didn't see him, she was fine. But she always saw him. He just always seemed to show up everywhere she went.  
  
Why did she have to see him? Why did she care? Why couldn't she just erase him?  
  
A butterfly fluttered over to her and landed on her nose.  
  
Her eyes crossed slightly as she looked at it.  
  
Finally she sighed and lowered her head. That was why. She was a butterfly, forever loyal to one person. And she just didn't know how to change that. She didn't know how to just move on. She'd tried...oh god, had she tried!...but all he had to do was look at her and she'd crumble.  
  
She was so weak.  
  
Her heart hurt. Her body hurt. Her mind hurt. Her soul hurt.  
  
She lowered her head to her raised knees, the butterfly fluttering over to land on her shoulder.  
  
At least it hurt.  
  
~~~  
  
He made his way back to his house. He'd gone to see Tsunade-sama to make his report on his mission. He had gone to the hospital to get his leg treated.  
  
He slid the door open and wandered tiredly to his room where he collapsed on the bed, his forearm rising to cover his eyes.  
  
That was one of the things that had changed.  
  
She looked the same from far away, but when you got close, it was like...she was a faded version of her former self.  
  
She didn't smile anymore.  
  
He missed that. He'd liked her smile. He liked to think that if she smiled now, he'd smile back. He couldn't have back then, but now he could. But now she didn't smile at him so he'd never gotten the chance to smile back at her.  
  
Then there were her eyes.  
  
Bright sea foam green eyes that used to have a myriad of emotions that would subtly mold the color of them. They were flat now. As if giant steel doors had been shut behind them. Now they were just a dull, numb and faded green.  
  
She'd ignored him.  
  
She'd acted as if he hadn't even been there.  
  
Deep down, that's what he hated the most. Through it all, she'd always been the first on his side, she'd even said she would follow him through hell if he'd only allow her.  
  
He couldn't do it.  
  
He still believed he'd made the right decision. But...there were moments when he wondered if maybe...maybe he should have explained it to her. He hadn't. He probably never would.  
  
He sighed and lifted his arm, sitting up slightly as he pulled down the blankets on his bed. Not bothering to get undressed, he slipped under the covers and promptly fell asleep. 


	3. Walking Away

Disclaimer: Naruto's not mine. A/N: Thank you so so much to everyone who's reviewed! I Really appreciate it, you have no idea how much it means to me to have someone not only acknowledge but even think enough about my work to comment. You guys have totally inspired me. I woke up this morning at 7 and read the reviews and became almost giddy with will to write. The result being this, Chapter 3! I hope you like it, once again; all comments are welcome and thank you again to everyone who already has.  
  
~~~  
  
The Butterfly Chapter 3  
  
~~~  
  
She heard steps; a soft rustling of the undergrowth came from her left. The butterflies that had been perching on her all took off simultaneously. She felt a vague impression of anger from them, as if upset that their alone time with her had been interrupted. Her inner self smiled in a self- deprecatory way, even the butterflies thought of her as their charge.  
  
A figure emerged from the shadows of the trees; he wasn't very tall, probably the same height as her (about 5'7") or maybe even a little shorter. His auburn hair had grown out, now covering the tattoo on his forehead with shaggy bangs; the longer strands in the back had been pulled into a ponytail at the base of his skull. He was still skinny, he still didn't eat very much, but he was physically stronger than her used to be. He could now rely on his own body to defend him and not a chakra consuming armor of sand. Her favorite change had to be his eyes though; once they had been completely surrounded with the sooty markings of insomnia but they had faded. They were still there, but more of a bruised purple color than coal black.  
  
He could sleep now.  
  
It was more out of habit that he didn't.  
  
He smiled at her, and she did her best to smile back as he came and sat beside her. A younger butterfly, blue and black in color, tried to land on him. Sand suddenly appeared, blocking Gaara's skin from the jealous butterfly that had tried to use its poison on him. Though its poison would only have induced mild drowsiness, it still shocked Sakura that the butterfly would consider her friend a threat.  
  
Even the butterflies treated her like a possession.  
  
Gaara turned to look at her.  
  
She looked back.  
  
His hand rose to push a few stray strands of pink hair that had fallen lose behind her ear so that he could get a better look at her face. The fingers from the same hand shifted to trace lightly along the black smudges under her eye.  
  
Normally, she didn't really like being touched anymore. But she had never minded when Gaara did it; he never did it for any other reason than to better grasp any kind of sensorial information.  
  
But that wasn't why she let him.  
  
She let him because he had been forced to go the majority of his life without the ability to use his sense of touch, a sense that had always been very important to her. So she let him out of sympathy. He couldn't touch then, she couldn't touch now. Her skin was poisonous.  
  
"You haven't been sleeping." he said simply.  
  
"No, I haven't." she responded.  
  
He looked sad.  
  
"Why do you let your demons control you?" he questioned softly after a moment as he looked away.  
  
She didn't answer; she just looked away as well. She closed her eyes softly and opened them again.  
  
Gaara was gone. There were no imprints in the grass where he had been.  
  
Sakura sighed.  
  
Great, insomnia finally evolves to narcolepsy.  
  
In her opinion, narcolepsy was infinitely worse than insomnia. At least with insomnia, she knew she was awake. With narcolepsy, she couldn't tell awake from asleep, reality from dreams. To top it off, narcoleptic sleep never left her feeling rested, only more confused.  
  
She rose from the field and started walking back to the town. She avoided the hero monument.  
  
She avoided the bridge.  
  
She crossed at another spot and wandered through the streets.  
  
"SAKURA!" a cheery voice called to her.  
  
She turned, surprised to find herself in front of the Yamanaka flower shop. Ino was waving as she rounded the counter to greet her.  
  
With a resigned sigh Sakura turned into the shop and was almost immediately engulfed in a suffocating hug from Ino.  
  
Ino must be in a good mood today.  
  
Over the years, as the rivalry had disintegrated (Ino had won having dated him for two months after his return), they had re-become "friends". At least, Ino had started treating her like a best friend again. Sakura had simply stopped picking fights with her.  
  
She'd stopped picking fights with everyone.  
  
"What have you done to yourself? You look terrible!" Ino was saying dramatically as she took in Sakura's messy hair, black smudged eyes and slightly gaunt cheeks.  
  
She hasn't been sleeping or eating nearly enough Ino thought slightly worried.  
  
What really worried her though were the questionable bandages around her forearms.  
  
Sakura shrugged slightly.  
  
"Well, it's your lucky day! I'm feeling beautiful and charitable today so I'm going to make you beautiful again!" Ino exclaimed. "Just like old times" she added with a soft smile.  
  
Yeah...just like old times... she silently agreed.  
  
Ino looked beautiful today, like she always did. Her platinum blonde hair had grown back out as well and was held in a low ponytail over her right shoulder. Long and elegant earrings dangled from her lobes. Her face had grown even more beautiful as age had defined it and her subtle but perfectly applied makeup only enhanced.  
  
She slept perfectly.  
  
What was the biggest similarity though was Ino's bright ice blue eyes, they were so happy. She knew her own were most certainly not.  
  
Just like old times...just like every time...  
  
While she'd been musing, Ino had been busy untangling the elastic from her hair. It had dried in the mess and was now rather wavy as opposed to her normally straight. Ino had grabbed a brush from somewhere and was patiently detangling the long pink strands.  
  
It had been a long time since someone had brushed her hair for her. Not since that one time Kakashi-sensei had been trying to comfort her after her parents had died. He'd always been very kind to her.  
  
She hadn't seen him in a long time.  
  
Ino was done brushing her hair now and had been chattering on about how wonderful things were between she and Shikamaru. The pair had finally hooked up almost two years ago now. Most had been surprised it had taken them so long. She hadn't been. She knew Ino and Ino was a coward when real emotions were concerned. It hadn't been real emotions for her with Sasuke, but it was real emotions when it came to Shikamaru.  
  
"We're thinking about moving in together soon." Ino was saying as she wandered over to a shelf and picked up two beautiful pink and white orchids.  
  
She made a slight noncommittal sound that showed she was listening and Ino went on, happy to be able to chatter her heart out as she wove the orchids and the hair by her left ear into a smallish braid, securing the flowers along the hairline by her left temple and ear.  
  
"There, perfect!" Ino exclaimed as she looked at her work of art and found a mirror to show her.  
  
She stared.  
  
Ino always had gotten better marks in flower arranging...  
  
Dead eyes stared back.  
  
The flowers didn't suit her anymore; they made her look like she was twelve again.  
  
She wasn't twelve anymore though.  
  
She smiled slightly, but it never reached her eyes, and thanked Ino quietly before saying she had an errand to run and leaving the shop.  
  
Ino watched her go, eyes full of worry.  
  
"What's wrong?" Shikamaru asked as he entered the shop and walked over to her.  
  
He pulled her lightly into her arms and Ino was grateful to have him there to lean on.  
  
"Its Sakura...she's getting worse." She said quietly.  
  
Shikamaru frowned slightly and hugged Ino a little tighter.  
  
~~~  
  
Sakura walked on, finding her way to the Hokage tower. Maybe she'd finally have a mission, a distraction.  
  
She made her way to Tsunade's office; the door was open so she walked in.  
  
Tsunade looked up as she heard her enter and smiled somewhat reservedly at her.  
  
She's getting worse...was Tsunade's only thought as she saw the black smudges under her eyes, and noticed the freshly dried blood marring the bandages on her arms.  
  
Tsunade knew for a fact that she hadn't been in a real combat for almost two years now and her only sparring partner was Rock Lee who could barely dare to throw a punch at her, let alone anything sharp.  
  
Those were self-inflicted.  
  
"Are there any missions today?" she asked bluntly.  
  
Tsunade bit her lip slightly. She didn't want to send her on missions. She was just too unstable. She might do something dangerous or she might even be desperate enough and get herself killed.  
  
"No, I'm afraid we don't have anything suitable for you" Tsunade said with a slightly strained voice.  
  
Despite your rank, you're too weak for the A and B rank missions but I don't want to insult you by sending you on a C rank is what she understood.  
  
It was the same routine everyday.  
  
She nodded slightly before turning and leaving.  
  
Tsunade sighed and leaned back in her chair. She knew that she wasn't helping Sakura by denying her her position among the Konoha ninjas but she just couldn't bring herself to send her on a mission. It felt too much like signing Sakura's death warrant.  
  
But watching her disintegrate and rot here...she almost felt like she'd signed her death warrant regardless.  
  
If only Kakashi were still here...he'd seemed to reach her after her parents death...no one else had.  
  
But Kakashi was missing.  
  
He'd left along with a group of hunter nins about three years ago to take down the Akatsuki. They'd succeeded and most of the hunters had returned.  
  
Kakashi had not.  
  
Whether he was dead or not was undetermined but at this point there were only three possible explanations: 1) he was dead, 2) he had severe amnesia and didn't remember who he was or where he was from and so couldn't return or...3) he'd consciously abandoned the village and was now a missing nin.  
  
Tsunade secretly hoped he was dead, it was the best fate he could have.  
  
~~~  
  
Sakura found herself on the bridge.  
  
She wasn't sure if she was awake or not. She didn't feel awake but she didn't really feel asleep either.  
  
She felt like she was twelve. Any moment now Naruto was going to rush up shouting "Sakura-chan" and the top of his lungs.  
  
No one called her "Sakura-chan" anymore...  
  
And then from the woods, he would emerge, smirk at Naruto's antics, ignore her and sit under a tree.  
  
Then they would wait until suddenly with a puff of smoke Kakashi would show up with some lame, made up excuse for his lateness.  
  
Of the three things, the last was the least likely.  
  
For the first year, she'd kept coming everyday and waited. She'd kept expecting him to just pop up and apologize for being so late, claiming he'd had to save a village from an army of ogres and then save a damsel in distress from a dragon.  
  
Or some such nonsense.  
  
She missed his nonsense.  
  
He'd been like a parent to her, had even invited her to stay with him after her parents had died. But now he'd left her too.  
  
Everyone left her.  
  
She sighed and rested her arms and the bridges railings, waiting.  
  
She was always waiting.  
  
"Why do you let your demons control you?"  
  
She bit her lip and stared down at the water.  
  
~~~  
  
Tsunade looked up in surprise as Sakura entered her office for the second time today.  
  
Had her mental health deteriorated so much that she thought they were already the next day?  
  
"Do you have any missions for me?" She asked firmly, determination in her eyes.  
  
Tsunade was stunned, this was the first time she had been determined about anything in years. Tsunade shook her head slightly.  
  
"Will you ever have any missions for me?" she asked, now she seemed slightly pained.  
  
Why was she so emotional today?  
  
Tsunade's heart clenched as she bit her lip and a pained expression colored her eyes.  
  
She looked down and shook her head again.  
  
Sakura closed her eyes briefly. She'd expected as much, but the truth still hurt.  
  
She really was useless here.  
  
She looked at Tsunade. The Hokage looked like she was in pain, as if some poison were seeping through her blood.  
  
She was that poison.  
  
Her resolve firmed and she lifted her chin.  
  
"I'm leaving." She said simply.  
  
Tsunade's head snapped up and she stared at her in shock.  
  
"What? Why?!" she questioned, almost desperately. She couldn't let Sakura go and get herself killed in the real world, Kakashi had asked her to look after her for him when he'd left.  
  
Sakura simply stared back at her and suddenly it hit her what a poor job she'd done in fulfilling her promise.  
  
"Will you return?" she asked now resignedly, she looked older...for the first time, Tsunade felt old.  
  
"I don't know." She answered simply.  
  
Tsunade nodded, her head falling. She just couldn't look at the girl anymore.  
  
She heard something being placed on her desk and then heard the girl leave.  
  
Tsunade looked up then. On her desk lay Sakura's leaf forehead protector.  
  
Tsunade's hand raised and rubbed her chest, over her heart. That spunky little girl she'd liked so much really was gone.  
  
Naruto would throw a fit when he returned.  
  
~~~  
  
The sun was starting to lower, it was mid afternoon. She made her way through the streets of the village.  
  
She owed some goodbyes.  
  
The first stop had been the Yamanaka flower shop. Ino had been surprised to see her again, seeing Sakura twice in one day was a great rarity.  
  
Even rarer had been that Sakura had spoken. She'd thanked Ino for her friendship and for everything she'd done for her.  
  
She'd smiled.  
  
It had been a small and sad smile, but it had been a smile. She'd said goodbye as she left.  
  
She'd never said goodbye.  
  
For some reason Ino didn't really understand yet, as she'd watched Sakura's retreating back, she hadn't been surprised.  
  
Ino had then called to her mother in the backroom; she'd needed to leave for a minute.  
  
She'd needed to tell him she was leaving, she'd known that she wouldn't.  
  
~~~  
  
Sakura's next stop had been the ramen store but no one she'd wanted to see had been there. So she'd gone to his apartment.  
  
Hinata had answered the door.  
  
Naruto wasn't home, he was on a mission. He wasn't due to return for another two days.  
  
Sakura couldn't wait.  
  
"Just tell him thanks for me, ok? And...and tell him goodbye" Sakura had said with a small, sad smile.  
  
Hinata had frowned slightly, confused by the request and not quite understanding why Sakura wouldn't be here two days from now, but had agreed to comply with her request.  
  
Then she'd gone to the bridge.  
  
She'd stood there for a long time, staring at the water. Making her peace with the past.  
  
This was the last time she would be here.  
  
I'm sorry Kakashi-sensei...but I just can't wait for you anymore. I've become a poison and I'm dying from it. Maybe...somewhere else...there's a cure...I'm sure there isn't one here.  
  
She looked up at the canopy of the bridge, specifically to the bar he always appeared on.  
  
"Goodbye." She whispered.  
  
~~~  
  
The sun was starting the set, the light fading away as she had faded away.  
  
How appropriate.  
  
Her meager belongings had been packed into an old backpack; her money had been hidden in an inner pocket of her pants. She'd pulled her lose hair into a long braid, incorporating the smaller braid and flowers that Ino had put there earlier.  
  
She couldn't bring herself to take them out just yet.  
  
She stared at the gate as the guards opened it for her. She took a deep breath and winced as she heard all too familiar footsteps rushing towards her.  
  
He stopped five feet behind her.  
  
"What are you doing?" he demanded in his deep, dark voice.  
  
She raised her head and looked contemplatively at the world beyond the village.  
  
"I'm leaving." She said simply.  
  
Something inside him tensed suddenly.  
  
"Leaving? Just like that? You weren't even going to say goodbye?" he demanded anger covering the hurt as he took a step towards her.  
  
"Did you ever tell me goodbye?" she asked softly.  
  
He froze and looked away.  
  
"Why?" he questioned, calmer now as he raised his eyes to her.  
  
"Why not?" she countered softly as she turned to look at him.  
  
His voice died in his throat at the sight of her wounded eyes.  
  
He didn't answer.  
  
She stared at him, held his eyes for a minute...two minutes...an hour...he couldn't tell.  
  
Then she looked away and an overwhelming sense of loss overcame him.  
  
"I gave you much better reasons to stay." She said simply as she turned away.  
  
He collapsed to his knees.  
  
She walked away.  
  
He let her leave.  
  
She didn't look back.  
  
He watched her back disappear.  
  
The gate closed. 


	4. Role Reversal

Disclaimer: No, I unfortunately do not own Naruto the series or the characters involved in it, I'm just borrowing them for a little while and promise to put them back exactly where I found them, hopefully no worse for wear.  
  
A/N: Thanks again to everyone who has reviewed. I really and truly do appreciate it and am anxious for your impressions on this chapter. I'm not sure how I feel about it...it feels a little off to me but it's the best I could do. So let me know what you think and if you have any ideas, please send them my way. I'm really just writing this as it comes to me and have no real destination in mind with it.  
  
~~~  
  
The Butterfly: Chapter 4 By: Tea Leaf / Banana Soap  
  
~~~  
  
For a long time he just stared.  
  
The sun slowly sunk behind the horizon and clouds blew in overhead. The light died.  
  
Still he stared.  
  
Slowly, almost lazily, fat drops of cold water began to fall. They soon picked up speed though and it became a race between thousands upon thousands of drops, from the heavens to the earth. He was soaked.  
  
He didn't notice.  
  
Tsunade watched sadly. He'd been there for over two hours now. The guards had sent for her, he was starting to unnerve them. With a soft sigh she walked towards him, an umbrella protecting her from the onslaught of rain. She crouched down beside him covering him with the umbrella as well as she placed a hand on his back.  
  
He didn't react.  
  
"Its time to go home now Sasuke." She said softly.  
  
His eyes shifted away from the gate, down to the ground then up to the rain. He seemed confused, how could he have not noticed the storm.  
  
Then it hit him: she was out in the storm.  
  
His eyes snapped to the gate again in sudden alarm and his muscles tensed as he was about to rush after her.  
  
Tsunade grabbed his arm, stopping him.  
  
"Its time to go home Sasuke" she said again, her voice a little firmer, a little more convincing.  
  
He looked at her. She was tired. She was weary. She looked old. She was sad too. She was telling him he couldn't go after her, at least not yet.  
  
He nodded slightly and the pair stood up. He walked away, soon disappearing in the rain.  
  
Tsunade watched him go then turned and walked to the gate placing her hand on its seam.  
  
Good luck kid  
  
~~~  
  
She walked. She couldn't stop walking. She couldn't look back.  
  
She didn't hurry, she knew that no one would come after her.  
  
She was a butterfly, out of sight out of mind. Just a detail in the scenery.  
  
She walked on.  
  
Then the rain started and she stopped as she raised her face to the cold droplets.  
  
She loved the rain. Nature's shower. She always felt clean after standing in the rain.  
  
Butterflies couldn't fly in the rain.  
  
She started walking again and the rain poured down for hours. Finally, she decided on a rest. She was tired, but not sleepy. She still couldn't sleep.  
  
She reclined under a tree, letting the water soak her clothes and coat her skin. She smiled ever so slightly at the sky.  
  
This was a good sign, she was sure of it.  
  
~~~  
  
Naruto sighed in contentment as the village came into view through the mists left by the continuing rain.  
  
Finally some decent ramen!  
  
He couldn't wait to see everyone, he'd been away for a week and had gotten a new scar, it had a cool story to, and he was going to tell it to everyone.  
  
And brag to Sasuke! He thought with a foxy grin.  
  
"Alright boys, just two more miles!" He cheered before taking off again.  
  
Jiraiya, Kankuro and Kiba all groaned. Naruto had been running at breakneck speed since this morning, it was all they could do to keep up.  
  
"Bah, let him go, we'll catch up later." Jiraiya muttered before taking out his spyglass and aiming it towards a river in the distance hoping some girls might be swimming despite the rain.  
  
Kiba and Kankuro sweat dropped but didn't complain, they were grateful for the rest as they sat down under a tree, hoping to get some shelter.  
  
~~~  
  
He lay on his side, curled slightly into a ball and staring at the wall below the window. It was still raining. It had been raining for days. Ever since she left.  
  
He hated the rain. It was cold, it was wet, it was miserable. He was miserable.  
  
He wouldn't move. He wasn't hungry. He couldn't sleep.  
  
Ino and Shikamaru had stopped by a day or so ago (he wasn't really keeping track of time) and had tried to get him to eat something. He hadn't wanted to.  
  
Tsunade had come by the next day and tried to help him sleep. None of her remedies had worked.  
  
Suddenly there was a large bang as his front door was thrown open. The heavy stomping of feet followed as the intruder ran up the stairs.  
  
He didn't move. He didn't react.  
  
With what seemed like an explosion of energy, Naruto burst into the room.  
  
He was about 5'10" now and had really filled out; he could easily have become a football player (if you know, they played football or knew what football was). Despite his heavily muscled bulk though, he was still as quick and agile as a fox. And right now, this fox had a huge grin slapped on his face and his blue eyes were practically glowing with restraint excitement.  
  
He ignored him.  
  
"Yo, Sasuke!" Naruto boomed out in his characteristically loud voice.  
  
"Go away." He muttered.  
  
Naruto frowned. "What the hell's wrong with you?" he asked, kinda ticked that Sasuke wasn't as lively as he was.  
  
"What the hell do you think?" Sasuke responded sarcastically.  
  
"How the hell should I know, I've been out of town for the past week!" Naruto replied with equal sarcasm.  
  
Sasuke was quiet a moment and Naruto was starting to consider asking again.  
  
"She left." He finally answered in a quiet voice, as if he didn't really want to admit it out loud.  
  
"She? She who?" Naruto continued to pry, concern starting to creep across his features.  
  
"Who do you think?" he responded harshly  
  
"Would you just tell me?!" Naruto yelled back.  
  
He glared at the wall and curled in on himself a bit more. He didn't answer.  
  
"Sasuke, who left?" Naruto asked in a calmer tone.  
  
"...Sakura...Sakura left." He said, some indistinct emotion straining his voice.  
  
Naruto froze but his shock was quickly overcome by anger.  
  
"I don't believe you!" He yelled harshly before taking off, running as fast as he could to Sakura's apartment.  
  
Sasuke didn't move.  
  
~~~  
  
He pounded on the door and when there was no answer, he broke the lock and went it.  
  
The room was empty, but the room had always been empty. He checked the drawers under her bed. The clothes were all gone. He checked the cupboards. They were all empty. He checked her window seat. The faint impression of a human was rapidly fading from the cushions; the blood on the windowsill had dried several days ago.  
  
A small blue and black butterfly was perched by the blood.  
  
He sat down on the sill.  
  
"Hey." Came a quiet voice from the doorway.  
  
Naruto looked up to see Hinata standing there and watching him.  
  
"Hey." He said back in a withdrawn tone.  
  
Hinata walked over and hugged him tightly.  
  
Naruto hugged her back; she always knew just what he needed.  
  
"She came to see you two days ago but you weren't home." Hinata began in her soft voice.  
  
"She asked me to give you a message though." She continued. Naruto looked up a little hopefully.  
  
"She said thank you, thank you for everything. And she said goodbye." Hinata said, sadness creeping into her voice as she locked eyes with him.  
  
He hugged her closer as he felt tears start to sting his eyes.  
  
She was gone...  
  
Now, of course he knew she wasn't the same person anymore and of course he knew that he couldn't help her but still...  
  
He'd known this would happen. Sakura had never been the type to go down without a fight once she was trapped in a corner. And she'd been living with her back pushed harder and harder against the wall for a long time now. And now she was trying to fight back. He knew that, he understood that.  
  
But she was still his friend. And it still hurt that she had left.  
  
~~~  
  
Sakura looked up at the clouds as the rain started to calm, it looked like the storm was clearing up.  
  
She kept walking, her pack feeling a little heavier now that she had raided the group of bandits she'd stumbled upon. She was still in the fire country, she knew that much but she really had no idea where in the fire country. Honestly, she didn't really care.  
  
She still wasn't sure was she was looking for; something just kept pushing her to keep moving.  
  
The sky was clearing and the sun was setting, she decided to find an inn to stay at tonight and try to dry her clothes out.  
  
She found a main road easily enough and about a mile after she'd started following the well-worn stretch she'd come to a comfortable inn with a spare room for the night.  
  
She set her pack down in the room and took everything out, spreading it across the room in hopes of dispelling the dampness. As for the clothes she was wearing, they were soaked but so was everything else so she didn't bother to change before heading back down to the common room for a meal.  
  
She took a small table in a shadowy corner, watching the room. No one looked familiar.  
  
She didn't suppose anyone would ever look familiar again.  
  
In another corner of the room there was a stage that was well lit and currently empty. The sign on the wall promised live entertainment later tonight though.  
  
She enjoyed live music.  
  
~~~  
  
Tsunade stared at Sasuke. He hadn't moved since the last time she'd seen him. From the slight gauntness in his cheeks she'd bet good money that he hadn't eaten since then either. The dark smudges under his eyes proved he hadn't slept.  
  
Man! What a pain. One ghost leaves only to create another one!  
  
She had no idea what to do.  
  
"Sasuke, you can't just lie here. You have to do something. Even Sakura at her worst still moved!" Tsunade exclaimed in frustration.  
  
He winced at the sound of her name and pulled a pillow over his head.  
  
Tsunade could have cried in frustration. Of all the stupid things to say!  
  
She stomped over to him and grabbed the pillow pulling it off his head. He hid his head with his arms.  
  
"Sasuke! Please move! Eat! Do something! You're really starting to worry, not only me but all of your friends!" Tsunade said, desperate for some kind of reaction.  
  
She didn't get one.  
  
"Oh I give up!" she exclaimed as she tossed her hands into the air.  
  
"Eat something at least, Ino and Hinata have been stocking your fridge with homemade food all week. The least you could do is eat some of it." She said with a final "hmph" and left.  
  
He'd tried eating but everything tasted like ash. It made him feel sick.  
  
He was sick.  
  
Sick with worry, sick with guilt. Sick with misery.  
  
He didn't understand it. It wasn't like he even talked to her anymore but at least when she was here he could have, had he wanted to.  
  
Then why hadn't you?! His inner voice yelled at him.  
  
He winced.  
  
Why hadn't he? Maybe if he had he could have helped her and she wouldn't have had to leave.  
  
He stared at the wall.  
  
His eyes started to droop closed but he snapped them open again.  
  
Every time he closed his eyes, he saw her. But he didn't really see her. He didn't see the real her, he saw the her that she used to be. The one he'd destroyed.  
  
His eyes stung.  
  
Why did she have to leave? Why did she have to remind him? Why did she have to force him to acknowledge the damage he'd done. He just wanted to forget everything.  
  
Don't you understand? That's what I want to do too.  
  
He tried to shut his ears to her voice but he couldn't, it was coming from inside his head. His eyes closed again and he saw her as she had been that night, when she'd looked at him with those wounded eyes, when he'd finally seen how broken she really was.  
  
Her arms had been bandaged; there had been dried blood in the gauze. The gauze had been black specifically to hide how much blood there must have been.  
  
She'd been skinny, too skinny. He could see her bones. Her cheeks had been gaunt and shadowed.  
  
But it was her eyes. Her eyes had been open to him for the first time since the night he'd left.  
  
He'd finally seen it.  
  
Her ravaged soul, that gaping wound that just wouldn't heal. The wound he had caused.  
  
He'd seen her desperation.  
  
Through everything he'd gone through, she'd always been right beside him. She had always been the first to defend him, the only one to protect him.  
  
And how had he repaid her? He'd repaid her in pain. He'd told her off countless times, he'd brushed her off even more. He'd ignored her. He'd intentionally hurt her.  
  
His memory provided him with the vivid picture of her back with three shirukens protruding from between her shoulder blades. The lowest one, the one that had been a centimeter short of severing her spine...he'd thrown that one.  
  
He'd almost killed her.  
  
But still she had saved him when she should have been the first to condemn him.  
  
He couldn't lie to himself anymore. If there was any reason that he had finally been able to live a normal life, it was she.  
  
And he'd stolen her normal life.  
  
He'd left her. And then he'd been part of the attack that had killed her parents. Then he'd almost killed her.  
  
She should hate him, like he'd hated his brother.  
  
But that was what he loved most about her. She wasn't like him.  
  
Even more, she'd always brought out the best in him.  
  
~~~  
  
Sakura's eyes fluttered open. She couldn't remember the last time she'd felt so good.  
  
She'd slept.  
  
She had actually slept!  
  
A soft smile of contentment curved at her lips as she closed her eyes again and snuggled deeper into her bed.  
  
Rafael smirked at the latest addition to his gypsy tribe. She looked like a cat that had just had all the cream.  
  
He grinned mischievously as he prodded her ribs with his foot.  
  
She winced and her eyes snapped open in a glare.  
  
Her glare lessened slightly as she noticed the shock on his face.  
  
"I'm so sorry! I didn't realize you were hurt there!" he said quickly as he raised his hands in a defensive way.  
  
She scrutinized his appearance from the messy ash brown hair to the dark blue eyes, down his strong nose, past his thin lips beyond his stubbled chin and jaw, then over his lean body with his various layers of miscellaneous clothing.  
  
Finally she sighed and rolled over onto her back.  
  
"Time to go?" she asked.  
  
Rafael sighed quickly with relief (he'd seen what she did to the last guy who'd pissed her off) before smiling easily and nodding.  
  
She sighed and sat up then proceeded to start packing her things.  
  
She'd med the gypsies at the inn she had stayed at a week ago. They had been the live music. She'd stayed up late, listening to the tales of their travel and becoming enchanted with the idea of simply wandering wherever you felt with fascinating people for company and no real goal other than to appreciate life.  
  
Most of them had a secondary goal of making good music though and so she was currently being taught to play the guitar and had started secretly writing every now and then.  
  
It wasn't a rich life, it wasn't a glamorous life but it was a good life. She could lose herself in it; forget the past and maybe even start to recover.  
  
Despite that though, something in the back of her mind gave off a vague warning that something was wrong. But the voice was so weak the chatter of the misfit company she traveled with easily drowned it out.  
  
And so she walked on, the unnoticed butterflies trailing after her. 


	5. The Calm Before the Storm

Disclaimer: Nope, I don't own Naruto. Please don't sue.

A/N: Sorry for a slight delay folks, yesterday had to be taken off so I could study for my English lit exam that I wrote this morning. On a plus note though, the time off has helped me set out and organize my ideas so I actually have a vague but clear idea of the plot. A huge hug and thanks go out to dragonflyelj, her help and advice have been absolutely essential in the creation of the actual plot of the story. So thank you drogonflyelj, and thank you to _everyone_ who had reviewed my story, you really make me feel like my writing is worthwhile. So, I hope you all enjoy this new chapter and please remember to let me know what you think. I guarantee the next chapter will be up by tomorrow night at the latest.

~~~

The Butterfly: Chapter 5

By: Tea Leaf / Banana Soap

~~~

 The sky was that inky blue black of midnight. A small spattering of cold stars peeked out from behind the dissipating storm clouds. 

It had been raining again. 

The moon was missing from the sky; she guessed it was renewing itself.

Alone, she sat outside of the lingering light of the campfire and the noise of the tribe. A thin piece of charcoal was in her hand, a faded sheet of thick paper rested on her knees. Her eyes were numb as the words flowed to the page.

_//Step out the front door like a ghost_

Into a fog where no one notices 

_The contrast of white on white//_

She couldn't tell if the words were hers or if they were from something long forgotten. All she knew was that she felt relieved to write them.

_//And in between the moon and you_

_Angels get a better view_

_Of the crumbling difference _

_Between wrong and right//_

Her inner self sneered slightly now, too cynical for the imagery of angels. 

_//And I walk in the air_

_Between the rain_

_Through myself and back again_

_Where? I don't know.//_

She looked up to where the moon should be. There was only darkness but it was a quiet darkness. She felt calm.

She folded the paper, stashing it back into her pack with the charcoal. She then leaned back, untroubled green eyes watching the sky. 

There were steps coming from her left. She didn't look; she didn't want to talk to anyone right now.

"Ah, new girl!" Came a slightly slurred voice.

She didn't react.

"You're quite the pretty little thing you know. A little scrawny but you'll do." The voice continued as a hand reached out towards her.

She caught it and pushed it back until there was an audible snap.

The man cried out in sudden pain.

"You bitch! You'll pay for that!" He roared as he tried to lunge at her. 

He passed right through her shadow clone, reducing it to mere wisps of smoke. The real her sat undisturbed in the tree, simply waiting for him to leave.

She didn't like fighting the gypsies. 

The man looked around in a rage and then sudden fear, as he believed she had disappeared. 

She sighed. 

_{Well, at least the men won't harass me of they think I'm a witch…}_her inner self commented.

Her outer self simply watched as the man with the broken wrist ran back to the camp then she turned her eyes back to the sky.

~~~

Gaara walked slowly down the trail. He always walked slowly; he didn't believe in haste. He was a young man with all the time in the world on his hands and so he used it.

He was heading to the leaf village, he had a feeling that Sakura could use some support around now.

Last week had been the anniversary of her parents' deaths. Next week would be the anniversary of Kakashi's disappearance. 

She tended to get a little desperate around this time. 

~~~

He glared at Hinata as she apologetically force-fed him some ramen. Naruto had him in a body-lock hold and was plugging his nose so that he had to open his mouth to breath.

"Well, if you could just be bothered to eat on your own we wouldn't have been brought to such drastic measures." Ino said tartly from the door.

He simply glared. He didn't want food.

"Man, this is such a pain. I should be training not baby-sitting Uchiha." Shikamaru muttered under his breath.

Ino gave him a swift kick in the shins and a "smarten up" glare. Shikamaru kept his muttering to himself.

"So Sasuke-kun, have you heard anything from Sakura?" Ino asked brightly.

Sasuke's glare deepened and he clamped his mouth shut before Hinata could shove the next bite in his mouth.

"Heh, I swear Ino, sometimes you're such a blonde." Shikamaru said snidely with a smirk. 

Flames flared in her eyes and this time she gave him a swift kick somewhere a little more painful. 

Hinata tried her best to keep a straight face, Naruto looked traumatized and Sasuke was turning blue.

 "Ah, Sasuke! Open your mouth, you'll suffocate!" Hinata exclaimed, her voice slightly louder than usual.

Sasuke simply glared.

"Open your mouth you moron!" Naruto piped in.

Sasuke continued to glare, turning bluer and bluer.

"Oh Naruto, just let go!" Ino said crossly, still stinging from Shikamaru's comment. 

Naruto held on for another second before finally relenting and letting go.

Sasuke's color returned to normal as he took deep breaths from his nose.

Hinata sighed; they wouldn't be able to get any more food in him now.

"Well, I guess that's enough for today. But we'll be back tomorrow to check on you!" Hinata told Sasuke sternly. 

He rolled his eyes and looked away.

Naruto glared at him and punched him in the arm. No one rolled their eyes at his girlfriend, not even Uchiha Sasuke. Hell, ESPECIALLY not Uchiha Sasuke!

Sasuke bit his lip to stop from reacting, the bastard had charlie-horsed him. 

Finally Naruto let go of him and he collapsed on his bed again, easily finding the deep groove his body had formed after days and days of immobility.

The group sighed collectively. At least Sakura had put some effort into living, Sasuke was just wasting away. 

Hinata stood and cleared up the dishes from the food they'd been forcing on Sasuke. Naruto went over to Shikamaru to help him up now that he was recovering from Ino's kick. 

"Remind me not to crack blonde jokes about Ino again." He muttered.

Naruto chuckled "With the amount of pain she's put you through because of them, it should be conditioned into your brain by now." 

Shikamaru grinned "Well you know me, I like to live dangerously." He commented sarcastically.

Hinata laughed softly, Ino rolled her eyes. Sasuke ignored them.

"See you tomorrow Sasuke-kun" Ino called as they left.

_{Finally, some peace and quiet.}_

 ~~~

Rafael bit his lip. He was torn. The fellow members of his tribe had come to him with very legitimate complaints against Sakura. She didn't do any of the women's work, she'd injured several of the men who had tried to make her comply and they seemed to believe she used witchcraft. 

But the fact of the matter was, the only women's chore she wasn't helping out in was something women like her weren't expected to do. She was from a society where women were people, not items as they were in this tribe. In her world, she was perfectly justified in defending herself against the male tribe members' advances. 

But this wasn't her world, it was his tribe. She'd joined it and she should have to abide to the same code of conduct as everyone else. 

He sighed and looked over to where she was helping with the laundry. Her hair was pulled back into a braid; there were a few stray soapsuds on her cheek. Her skin had started to gain some color from being outside and she was starting to get back to a healthier weight. She looked content participating in the menial chore.  

He sighed again and turned back to the men he was conferring with, the most adamant faced him directly, his wrist in a split and a vicious gleam in his eyes.

As much as he didn't want to have to sacrifice her like this, if he didn't there'd be anarchy in the tribe and probably a violent revolt. It was the physical well being of one versus the physical well being of many.

With a pained expression he nodded. 

The men grinned evilly and he already regretted having made the decision.

~~~

A/N: Well, that's all for this chapter, I'm sorry it's a little shorter but the next one should be fairly long to compensate.

A few notes on this chapter:

The words Sakura is writing at the beginning are lyrics from the song "Round Here" by the Counting Crows and are of course copyrighted to them.

For those who don't know (I'm not sure if the expression is used anywhere other then Canada which is where I'm from) a charlie-horse is a really strong punch to a pressure point in the upper arm or thigh and damn, do they ever hurt! 

Aside from that, I've been getting a lot of questions in reviews lately so I'm going to make up for chapter shortness with a Q/A session. I'm not going to go to specific questions but rather generic ones that should answer the specific ones in the process.

So, where is this fic hosted? 

This fic is currently on 3 web-sites and will soon be on a fourth as well.

On Fanfiction.net, my author name is Tea Leaf and the story can be found here: 

Also on my fanfic.net account are some older fics that I've written, two Gundam Wing ones and one Fushigi Yuugi, but I only ever finished one of them. There wasn't really much response so the inspiration left. But if you want to read them anyway, feel free and let me know if you think they're worth reviving. 

There is one problem with the version on FF.net though, every time I upload a chapter, it seems to disregard any italics I make and I don't know how to fix it. So there are some thoughts, that would normally be in italic so as to show the difference, that don't show up in the previous chapters. This chapter has been edited just in case the italics still don't appear so thoughts are now between {} ßthose brackets.  

Also, it appears that the site addresses get erased every time I upload it here so I'll put them in my author profile if you want to see them on the other sites. 

On MediaMiner.org, my author name is Banana Soap. Banana Soap is actually my online artist name and my account at MediaMiner was originally solely for art gallery purposes so if you go there you can find some of my artwork. Be sure to review it if you do ^_^

Soon, you will be able to find it on Rokudaime, a non-yaoi Naruto fanfic collective which can be found here , while there be sure to read "Wasted Years" by Mizerable, its increadible and helped inspire me to write Naruto fiction and brought about this fic.

Finally, it can also be found on AdultFanFiction.net at this address 

Now I've also been asked _why_ it's on AFF when there are no lemons in my story. Well, the short answer to that is that I really am not sure yet. Suffice to say I'm an exposure addict and will put anything up anywhere I can. I'm really glad I put it there though because my first review came from that site and that's also where I met dragonflyelj who's help has been indispensable. Also, The fic does contain some heavy adult situations and I'm thinking that as the story evolves it will become appropriate for it to be on AFF. I'll be sure to keep the FF.net version clean though. 

Pairings: Unsure, looking kinda SakuSasu, I may play on some SakuKaka in the past or maybe in the future if he's not dead, and then there's always the Sakura/Gaara option which hasn't been done often so might be more appealing to me while writing…So you'll all just have to keep reading to find out.

About Kakashi: What happened to him? Is he dead? Is he alive? Where is he if he's not? Will he come back into the story? 

I can't tell you! It'll give too much away! So you'll just have to wait in suspense with me as we see what happens as the chapters come out. I don't have it all planned out, just a few general ideas after all.

I got a really good question about Sakura's fighting abilities, why is she not being given any missions? Why do people still think of her as weak if she has the butterflies?

Well, people don't think she's weak, _she_ thinks she's weak. Most people are actually really afraid of her and the reasons for that will become clear in, well, the next few chapters. 

As for the missions, it's not that she's not receiving them because she's incompetent, it's because she's mentally unstable. Tsunade can't trust Sakura's nerves and mentality enough to give her the responsibility of a B or A rank mission. She's not sure Sakura can handle it and at this level of mission, it's crucial that she can.

As for the nature of the butterflies poison and such, that will become clearer in the next few chapters as well.

And I think that's all for now, thanks for bearing with me through these long explanations ^_^

If you have any questions or if there's anything else that's ambiguous to you, please don't hesitate to ask your questions or ask for clarification. 

See you next chapter! 

~ Tea Leaf / Banana Soap 


	6. Poison

Disclaimer: Still don't own Naruto. Please don't sue.

A/N: A warning right now, things get darker and harder for Sakura as of now so if you're here hoping to see her make a miraculous recovery back to happy twelve year old Sakura again…well, that's not going to happen. Also, for those reading the story, I highly suggest that you get your hands on a copy of some fan translated manga chapters (you can find some at NarutoFan.com. I would recommend reading as much as you can seeing that the manga is much further advanced then the animated series but chapter 181 is really crucial to this fic. Thank you those who have reviewed Chapter 5, and here's Chapter 6 a day earlier than projected ^_^

~~~

The Butterfly: Chapter 6

By: Tea Leaf / Banana Soap

~~~

The memory was hazy, but as her feet walked softly through the halls, her surroundings seemed to clear from the mists. The room to his door was open; he always left it open so he could hear what was happening around his apartment better. She was pretty sure he was asleep; his book was covering his face. 

She paused in the doorway, afraid to go in. She caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror on the wall opposing the door. A sixteen year old girl with skin as white as a sheet stared back; there were dark blue rings under her eyes. She was still pretty battered; with bandages wrapped abound her limbs and torso. The worst wounds were the ones on her back though, the three shiruken wounds between her shoulder blades. She'd deserved them.

She still hadn't moved. He still hadn't moved. He was probably asleep.

She opened her mouth but no sound came out. She closed it again and took a fortifying breath through her nose. She opened her mouth again.

"Ka…Kakashi-sensei…" she said, her voice coming out barely above a whisper. 

He reacted then, lifting the book high enough so that he could see her. He frowned.

"Sakura? What's wrong?" he asked, concern threading his voice.

She opened her mouth but again her voice failed her. She tried again.

"I…I had a…a nightmare…" she whispered brokenly, terror filling her large green eyes.

He sat up, setting his book aside.

"Come here." He said softly.

She ran to him, he hugged her tightly as she shivered convulsively from fear. 

She didn't want to go back to sleep so they'd sat like that for hours. He hadn't asked her to explain or speak of it and he hadn't tried to comfort her with cheap words and frivolous actions.

He'd simply held her tight and it had been exactly what she'd needed him to do.

Her eyes started to droop closed as exhaustion finally began to overcome her, the room grew fuzzy again until finally all she could remember was the warmth of his body and his clean and cool scent.

~~~

Her eyes fluttered slightly, or at least attempted to. Her right eye was swollen shut, her left eyelid was sticking due to the blood that must have seeped down from the cut on her brow into her eye and had since dried. 

She could taste blood in her mouth as well. Her lip was swollen and sliced, she'd bitten her tongue badly enough for it to still be bleeding. A few teeth were loose but not so much that they would need to be ripped out. 

She raised a hand painfully to wipe the blood from her good eye. 

She felt groggy and very, very sore. She wasn't sure what had happened though; she couldn't really remember anything beyond supper around the fire. The man with the broken wrist had given her some tea…

_{Fuck…the bastard drugged me…}_

She opened her eyes as best she could. She was lying on her side, her head was facing the camp but she couldn't see anything through the early morning mists.

She pushed herself onto her back, groaning with the effort and wincing at the sharp pain in her ribs.

Her hand rose to prod at it gingerly. _{Yup…that's broken…}_

She forced herself into a sitting position, taking a mental inventory of her aches and pains. 

The back of her head hurt and her hair was matted with dried blood, she seemed to have fallen and hit her head on a rock.

She was bruised essentially everywhere, but every now and again the hits that had caused the bruises had been so hard they'd broken the skin as well. The worse ones had broken bones. 

Her shirt was gone; the gauze around her chest was ripped and half unraveled. Her pants were reduced to ribbons and were barely high enough on her hips to be considered decent. 

She sighed and then winced as her broken rib reminded her of its presence. 

_{Fucking trusting nature…never did anything but get me beat up…}_ her inner self sneered. 

She ignored her inner self and set about treating her wounds. Her pack was within arms reach and so she reached, biting her lip against the pain from her side, and pulled the pack closer.

The first thing she grabbed was a kunai from her pack followed by a jutsu scroll. She put the scroll between her teeth and bit down a bit as she made an incision about two centimeters below her broken rib. 

Her teeth dug deeper into the scroll as she pushed her fingers into the cut and reached up to catch the two edges of her rib and pushed them back together and then back into their natural position. 

Her eyes watered involuntarily as pain seared along her nerves. 

She took her fingers out of the wound and wiped the blood against her tattered pants. She then found a needle and tread in her pack and sewed the cut closed. 

Next was her right shin, also broken. She looked around her and found two decent sized sticks in close enough proximity to be able to get them without too badly disturbing her freshly set rib. 

The scroll still held tightly by her clenched teeth, she braced herself against some ambiguous but solid mass beside her and pushed the snapped leg bone back into place. She then set the two splints on either side on her leg and wrapped in tightly in gauze. She then proceeded to do the same for her ribs and then moved on to the treatment of her smaller cuts and bruised. Thankfully she'd brought some of Hinata's disinfecting ointment and placed it on all her cuts. It wasn't perfect, but it would do until she reached the next town and could get some proper medical treatment and supplies.

Pain fogged her mental capacities and nausea disoriented her. She was pretty sure she'd lost a significant amount of blood too and felt light headed. 

But still she pushed herself to her feet swaying dangerously for a moment then wincing slightly as she pulled her pack over her shoulder. 

She removed the scroll from her mouth, ignoring the tears her teeth had made and the blood that marred the once white paper, and slipped it back into her pack.

_{Ok…body treated…what next…other people, right…}_

Her one good eye and badly swollen one looked around critically at her surroundings. Other people were supposed to be here.

Her gaze landed on the lump she'd braced herself against and she took a limping step forward to investigate.

Her eyes widened in shock and terror and she recognized the man with the broken wrist. 

But the broken wrist was his only defining feature. His skin appeared to have melted off. 

She stepped back quickly and cried out as her leg gave out beneath her and she fell, jarring her bruises, broken rib and sending her head swimming again. 

She paused briefly to recover before scrambling backwards only to stumble upon another such mutilated monstrosity.

Her nausea overtook her and she threw up, he stomach heaving for a full five minutes.

Meanwhile, the sun had been rising and the predawn mists were dispersing. Slowly the entire camp came into focus.

_{Everywhere…they're everywhere…}_

Her eyes widened even more as panic began to take control of her mind. 

There were corpses everywhere. Men, women children…everyone was dead. 

She stood up, headless of her body's pain and the dizziness and nausea that continued to swamp her senses.

She simply ran. 

As fast and as far as she could. She fell often but she didn't stop, she had to keep going. 

She knew what had caused those melting burns that covered all of the gypsies. She knew what poison caused that agonizing death. The butterflies' poison caused that.

Her poison caused that.

She caused that.

~~~

Gaara watched the crows flying low near the gate of the Konoha village.

_{A bad omen}_

He walked forward regardless and was admitted without question. 

He was a regular visitor here and very well known.

His feet sped up slightly, he was worried. They took him straight to Sakura's apartment. From the end of the hall, he saw that the door had been forced open. He broke into a run, bursting into the apartment.

But it was empty. And had been empty for a long time.

He looked around slowly, taking in the details. There on the windowsill, beside blood so old it had turned black, was a dead butterfly.

His eyes widened in sudden fear and took off back out the door, down the hall, out of the building, to the other side of town.

~~~

He heard the door to his house being slammed open again, followed by the pounding of feet on the stairs. The door to his room practically exploded open.

Sasuke's eyes widened slightly in surprise. He'd expected Naruto.

Gaara stood there, eyes wild and frantic as he gulped in air.

"Where…is she?!" he exclaimed between breaths.

Sasuke almost felt bad for him. Obviously, she hadn't told him she was leaving either.

"She left." He replied.

"What?" Gaara exclaimed, a look of anguish passing over his features.

"She left. Must be at least three weeks ago now." He responded.

Gaara looked shocked, Sasuke suspected he might be trying to hold back tears. Then he collapsed against the wall by the door, falling to the ground with his back leaning on the wall.

"Three weeks is more then enough time to get to the sand village…" he said brokenly.

Sasuke sat up, maybe he did feel bad for Gaara after all. It was understandable that she would abandon him, but she had no reason to abandon Gaara. 

Sasuke went over and sat beside him and together they sat, silently staring at the wall.

~~~

"Hokage-sama?" came a voice from the doorway.

Tsunade looked up sharply, she'd been trying to work but her eyes had kept straying to the forehead protector resting on her shelf.

"What is it?" she asked, glad for the distraction.

The ninja looked down. "I have bad news." He said simply. 

He walked into her office then, carrying a lumpy rag bundled in his arms. He turned a bit then and pulled down the blanket and there, staring out from the depths of the cloth, was a small, dirty, tear-stained face with wide, traumatized brown eyes.

"What happened?" she asked, compassion for the child filling her.

~~~

"You're a selfish bastard, you know that?" Gaara muttered bitterly as he stared at the wall.

"Aa, I'm told that a lot" he muttered back with equal bitterness.

"This all happened because of you." Gaara continued.

"I know. She made sure to remind me of that when she left." He responded.

"Good, you deserve every bit of suffering she can put you through." Gaara said, still bitter, still staring and the wall.

"Yeah, I do." Sasuke responded, still bitter, still staring at the wall.

They were silent again, both dealing with their own unique feelings of inadequateness. 

"Uchiha-san?" came a voice from down the stairs.

"Go away" Sasuke called back.

There was the sound of feet running up the stairs.

"Ah, Gaara-san, you're here too. Excellent." The chuunin ninja said as he spotted the pair.

"The 5th Hokage-sama requires an audience with you both immediately." The chuunin continued.

Sasuke and Gaara continued to stare at the wall.

"No" they both said in unison.

The chuunin was stunned. But then smiled slightly.

"She said you might say that. Then she said it really is important, it involves Haruno Sakura." The chuunin continued.

Both looked up sharply and disappeared from the room so quickly the chuunin thought he'd been hit by a minor cyclone.

~~~

"The entire tribe was wiped out with the sole exception of one very very terrified little girl." Tsunade was saying.

"Though there is no physical evidence of she herself having been there, the little girl described her perfectly right down to the scars on her back. Also, this was found at the scene." Tsunade pulled out a plastic back, inside was a perfectly preserved, large black and crimson butterfly. 

Gaara glared at it, he hated those butterflies.

Sasuke's eyes widened slightly and he shifted away from it, he hated those butterflies.

"Also, the cause of death for every single recovered corpse has symptoms similar to both burns and a flesh-eating disease, the very effects of the poison found to be coating these butterflies. We know that Sakura is immune to the poison and that she can control these butterflies" Tsunade continued.

"Sakura has been declared a mass-murderer by the government and seeing as the murder took place within the flame country's borders it falls to Konoha village to eliminate her. However, we do not have any ninjas that can counter the butterflies. That's why I've asked you here Gaara." She said as her eyes focused on him and held his gaze.

"Your armor of sand is the prefect defense against these butterflies which are widely recognized as Sakura's only truly threatening ability." 

"You underestimate her." Gaara responded coldly.

Tsunade swallowed at the sudden dangerous gleam in his eyes.

"All the more reason for us to send you then, you seem to have a better idea of her abilities than we do." Tsunade covered.

Gaara looked at her for a long time. He did not respond.

"What about me?" Sasuke suddenly spoke up.

"You are the survivor of a massacre such as the one that child has just witnessed, you have been down every possible path of recovery and so know what will help her heal and what will not. You will help her overcome her ordeal and rehabilitate her." The 5th Hokage responded.

"What?" Sasuke exclaimed, he couldn't stay here and baby-sit!

"So Gaara, do you accept?" Tsunade asked, turning to the young sand-nin again and ignoring Sasuke's outrage.

Gaara closed his eyes as he collected his thoughts dragging out a moment of tense silence.

"No." he responded finally.

"What?!" Tsunade and Sasuke both exclaimed in unison.

"I cannot help her. She had the opportunity to come to me for aid before hand and she did not. I am not the one she needs." He responded with brutal honesty.

"Then what do you suggest?" Tsunade exclaimed, frustration making her words harsher than she'd intended.

"I suggest you send the one who could have an effect on her and you leave me to care for the child. Though I have not survived a massacre, I have been the cause of many. It is only right that I be the one to help her." Gaara responded softly as he held Tsunade's gaze.

"But who should I—" Tsunade's words froze in her throat as Gaara turned his gaze to Sasuke.

"But…"

"I would have gone with or without your command." Sasuke responded in his typical cold arrogance, Tsunade didn't know whether to be annoyed that he'd intended to disobey her orders or glad that he was starting to show colors of his former self.

She sighed.

"Fine." 

~~~

Gaara watched from the wall as Sasuke disappeared from sight. He hoped he'd been right about what he'd said.

There where times when he questioned whether Sasuke was really what Sakura needed.

He turned away from the woods to face the city again. The day was dragging on, and the sun was lowering, casting everything in an odd kind of gilded light.

He jumped down and headed to the hospital.

Tsunade was there waiting for him and led him into a guarded room. 

Tsunade seemed to be worried Sakura's butterflies would come back for the child. Gaara knew they wouldn't. The child was no threat to them.

He walked into the room and there on the bleached white sheets lay a tiny body. She looked a little underfed and she was a little dirty but aside from that, physically speaking, she was no worse for wear. 

He walked closer and she opened her eyes, large brown eyes haunted by some demon he couldn't see. He imagined his eyes must have looked like that back then.

He smiled gently at her. She simply looked at him but her eyelids were heavy and they soon drooped closed. 

She hadn't been afraid of him.

He pulled a chair up to the bedside and sat down. He reached his calloused and tanned desert hand out and gently grasped her small, softer one. He held on gently.

Tsunade bit her lip as she left.

The girl would be ok with Gaara…the question was would Sasuke be ok with Sakura…

_{All I know is that even I'm not dumb enough to play those odds…}_

~~~

Sakura's lip twitched a little at the corner as visions of hanging out for movie night on the couch with Kakashi-sensei danced elusively in the corners of her mind. He'd always sat upside down on the couch, resting his torso on the seat with his legs thrown over the back and his head dangling near the floor. 

He said it improved blood circulation and help train against head rushes. 

A steady beep began to intrude upon the sound of the TV and the laughing as they'd thrown popcorn at each other. 

Soon the beeping brought her completely back to consciousness.

She was in a hospital. 

She looked around. Both eyes worked, it must have been over a day if the swelling from her right eye was cleared already. Her leg had been properly splinted and her ribs were properly bound. Her hair had been washed and braided, her head was bound with gauze wrapping. Her minor cuts had all been treated; a few had even been stitched. There was an IV stuck in her arm.

She sat up and disconnected herself from the machines. She then walked to the closet where she knew her bag would be. She hunted and found a pair of black cargo shorts that reached to just below her knees…They'd been Kakashi's but he never wore them so he'd given them to her. She pulled them on. Guy's shorts were always more practical than those little scraps of material that usually passed for girl's shorts. She then found a red tee shirt and gritted her teeth through the pain as she pulled it on. She then strapped on her shiruken and kunai pouches, followed by her sandals. She grabbed a wad of cash from her pack and tossed enough on the bed to cover the hospital expenses of two days and then grimaced as she pulled her pack onto her back.

She then jumped out the window, careful to land on her good foot. 

She couldn't stay here. She couldn't stay around people. 

She killed people.


	7. Confusion and Unconscious

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or any of its characters. No copyright infringement intended so please don't sue me.

A/N: Woohoo! This is officially the longest fic I've ever written on my own (I was a member of a collective of writers and we wrote about two full 400 page books together…) I hope you like it! A huge hug and cookie go out to Fly again for bouncing ideas around with me and helping me decide what to do about one of the characters (guess which one ^^). Thank you to everyone who's reviewed chapters 5 and 6, especially 6. It turned out exactly the way I'd wanted it too and am very proud of it. 

~~~

The Butterfly: Chapter 7

By: Tea Leaf/ Banana Soap

~~~

Shikamaru's eyes followed Ino's form as she paced across the room. She was wringing her hands. 

She was breaking his concentration.

Asuma grinned as he moved his rook to capture Shikamaru's bishop.

"HA! Take that genius!" he exclaimed in his gruff voice as cigarette smoke curled around his head.

Shikamaru glared at the chess game. In seven years he has never lost to Asuma and he wasn't about to start now. Damn Ino and her pacing!

He moved his pawn and captured Asuma's rook. 

"Ah! Damn it! I didn't see that one" Asuma grumbled.

Shikamaru's eyes snapped to Ino, now she was biting her thumbnail.

"Check!" Asuma said, more shock than glee coloring his tone. He'd never gotten Shikamaru into check before. 

Shikamaru looked down at the chessboard then back up at Ino. Chessboard…Ino…chessboard…Ino…

"Man, what a pain." He muttered as he knocked over his king.

"Sorry old man, I'm just not into the game today." He muttered in a self-deprecating tone. 

Asuma looked over his shoulder at Ino as she paced restlessly one hand fiddling with her long hair the other getting its thumbnail chewed off and smirked.

"I see. Same time next week?" He asked.

"Aa." Shikamaru responded as Asuma stood up and left 

_{Bastard's probably going to go gloat to Kurenai about beating me…man…this is so annoying} _he thought with a sigh as he cleared away the chess game.

Ino hadn't even noticed Asuma had left; she was too caught up in her own thoughts.

Shikamaru leaned back on his hands, still sitting on the floor and looked up at her.

"Ino." He said evenly. 

She seemed to snap out of her daze and stopped pacing but her right hand remained tangled in her ponytail and her thumbnail remained between her teeth. 

She looked at him questioningly.

"What's wrong?" he asked directly.

"Heh? Nothing's wrong." She said around the thumbnail she was still nibbling on.

Shikamaru raised an eyebrow.

"Oh no, you just always pace and fiddle with your hair and chew on your those nails you spend hours filling and "perfecting"." He responded sarcastically.

Ino looked away.

"In case you're wondering why Asuma's gone its because he won already." Shikamaru continued, as he looked away, an annoyed expression on his face.

 Ino looked back at him as her hand dropped from her mouth and she smiled. He was worried about her. 

She walked over to him and dropped down on the floor beside him, leaning on his shoulder as he slipped a hand around her waist.

"I…I heard something bad." The blonde began.

"What happened?" Shikamaru prodded.

"Its…its just a rumor I think…I hope…Its about Sakura…" she continued as she snuggled a little closer to him. He wrapped his other arm around her too.

"What was the rumor?" he questioned.

To his surprise, tears started to swim in her aqua eyes.

"The rumor is that…she…she killed." she sniffled. "She killed a whole tribe of people." She finished a little brokenly.

Shikamaru's eyes widened slightly. People thought Sakura was a murderer?

 "Apparently everyone's skin had been melted off, like what had happened to Orochimaru when Sakura used that poison on him…" she continued quietly.

Shikamaru was shocked; he didn't want to believe that Sakura could ever do such a thing…

"But I know Sakura would never do that but…now Sasuke's disappeared suddenly on some mission and Gaara's in the village looking after some strange little girl that people are saying is a survivor of the attack…and…and I was in Tsunade-sama's office yesterday and…she had one of those butterflies on her desk…" Ino continued as her tears started to overflow.

Shikamaru's eyes narrowed. 

"Tsunade-sama had one of the butterflies?" he asked.

Ino nodded against his neck as she pulled herself even closer to him, his arms tightened automatically.

"Those butterflies are the carriers of the poison, right?" he questioned more.

She nodded again. "I think so…why?" 

"We've seen those butterflies act without Sakura's order. They don't have the typical summoning bond with her as most animals have with most shinobi." He said.

"Why does that matter?" Ino asked, starting to compose herself.

 "It matters because the butterflies could have acted without Sakura's order. Meaning Sakura wouldn't have been the one that killed those people." Shikamaru continued.

Ino sat up suddenly and hit her head on Shikamaru's chin. 

"Itai…" they both muttered as they nursed their sore spots.

"We have to go see Tsunade-sama!" Ino said energetically once she had recovered.

Shikamaru sighed _{this is going to become troublesome, I can feel it…}_ he thought before standing and helping Ino to her feet as well.

The pair took off for the Hokage tower. 

~~~

He stood in the middle of the field. It was a barren clearing in the woods, a weeks direct travel due west from the village. The remnants of a camp were scattered around the hard packed earth. Scorch marks were easily spotted on the ground where bodies had once lain.

There was blood too but only in one spot.

There was a huge red-ish black stain coating a rather sharp rock that protruded from the uneven ground and a large puddle had discolored the area surrounding it. There were also other such discolored blood soaked patches of earth nearby. A body could easily be pictured among the stains.

He examined the rock more closely and there, stuck in the dried blood were three stands of broken pink hair.

Sakura had lain here and she had been badly injured.

He looked around some more and at about six paces from the blood there was another discolored patch near a scorch mark. Vomit. 

He looked around the camp again at all the scorch marks. His eyes narrowed behind his ANBU mask.

~~~

Tsunade remained impassive as Ino tried to bully information about Sakura out of her. 

"This case is classified." She stated simply.

Ino growled in frustration and looked like she would have leapt over the desk and attempted to beat the information out of the 5th Hokage had Shikamaru not grabbed onto her arm and held her back.

"We realize the information is classified Hokage-sama. But we've heard rumors. And from what little we've been able to gather, we think we can help. We don't believe Sakura killed those people." He said calmly.

"I understand that you don't want to think that Sakura could possibly be a murderer. You've known her for a very long time and were good friends with her. But face facts. Sakura was a highly unstable person; anything could have set her off and pushed her to homicidal or suicidal acts. For all we know, murdering a tribe in our land could be a form a passive suicide seeing as she would have knew we'd send ANBU out to eliminate her." Tsunade replied angrily.

Shikamaru's eyes narrowed slightly as he smirked.

"So a tribe was murdered and Sakura really is believed to be behind it and ANBU has been sent after her." He stated smugly.

Tsunade glared furiously. 

_{Damn Shikamaru and his strategies anyway!}_

She growled then in frustration.

"FINE! Close the damn door and sit down, I'll give you the details." She consented reluctantly. 

Shikamaru calmly closed the door securely as requested as Ino sat down and then joined the blonde in front of the desk.

~~~

The girl's eyes opened wide, passing from near comatose sleep to wide awake without even a blink.

Gaara was still sitting there holding her hand and watching her.

She turned to look at him. He simply looked back.

The silence stretched.

"Who are you?" she asked finally, in a very quiet and small voice.

"I'm Gaara." He responded in an equally low voice.

She nodded and looked at him for another moment before turning to look at the ceiling again.

~~~

He walked out of the hospital and back to the inn room he was using as a base as he gathered the background information about a crime.

A week ago they had found a girl matching Sakura's description unconscious in the woods. She'd been severely injured with a bad head wound, concussion, broken rib, broken leg and more cuts and bruises than the staff had been able to count. She'd been in the hospital for two days and then had mysteriously disappeared, leaving only some money on the bed. 

The wounds had been treated crudely but sufficiently when they found her. Her broken bones had already been set.

He collapsed on a chair in the small motel room; on the table was a spider web like drawing connecting all the information and possibilities of the crime. He grabbed a pencil and crossed out the option labeled "Mental Breakdown" as well as "Passive Suicide Attempt" and circled "Injured à Self Defense?" and proceeded to make a detailed list of her recorded injuries. He then wrote down "Unconscious?" in a clear spot and made a broken line to it from "Injured".

"Damn it Sakura…what the hell happened?" he muttered out loud as he stared at the web.

His eyes then shifted to the "Vomit" bubble. Why had she been sick? Was it a result of the injuries? Was it seeing the bodies? If it was seeing the body, does that mean she was surprised to see them? Had it been something else they'd done to her?

He growled in frustration. The more he hunted, the more questions he had.

The more questions he answered though, the more he was sure she was innocent of the crime. 

~~~

Ino's face had drained of its color and her fingers were pressed to her lips. 

_{Oh Sakura…What a horrible crime…}_

Shikamaru looked pensive.

"I don't think she did it. Even in her broken state she simply is not able to commit such an act. It takes more than mental stability to become a murderer, it takes a will to kill and she does not have that." He said finally.

Tsunade rolled her eyes, kids were so naïve.

"Then what _do_ you think happened?" she asked sarcastically.

"I think those butterflies acted on their own. Probably to protect her, but still without her consent." He responded.

"Are you trying to claim that these _insects_" here she tossed the bag with the butterfly onto her desk "think for themselves?" she asked skeptically.

"Well, the bugs the Aburame clan uses do. Why would these butterflies be any different?" he asked as he raised an eyebrow.

Tsunade frowned, she hadn't thought of that. 

_{Damn kid's always one step ahead of me, it really pisses me off…} _she thought it annoyance.

But then a brilliant thought occurred to her.

"That is a good point Shikamaru. One I would like you to investigate on our behalf." She said with a sweet smile.

Shikamaru froze. "What?"

"I want you to figure out the nature of these bugs and make a full report to me. We currently have ANBU hunting her down, we wouldn't want to kill her if there could be a reasonable amount of doubt for her innocence." Tsunade responded.

"I want to help too!" Ino picked up, if she could help save her friend, she'd do anything.

Tsunade considered.

"Alright, Yamanaka, Nara, this is your mission: discover the nature of these butterflies and create a case that would expose a reasonable doubt in Haruno Sakura's favor." She said officially as she crossed her hands on her desk.

Ino nodded, Shikamaru groaned _{what a pain…}_ and the pair stood up to leave.

"Oh before you go, do remember to be careful. These butterflies are highly poisonous, if they touch your skin it will essentially melt away and the poison spreads incredibly fast, so all your skin would melt away and you would…well, die." She said cheerfully.

The color drained from Ino and Shikamaru's face.

_{Now what have I gotten myself into? …}_ Shikamaru wondered and the pair gulped and left.

~~~

It was raining. She was limping. She kept slipping.

_{Damn broken bones…}_

She was pretty sure that she must be approaching the cloud country, the sky was always overcast and the rain simply kept pouring.

She didn't mind the rain though. It kept the butterflies away and she half hoped she could lose them. 

The days had been spent walking until she lost consciousness either to pain, hunger or exhaustion and then walking when consciousness was regained. 

She didn't stop to rest. Every now and then, when the growling in her stomach was too painful, she'd lift her head and drink the rainwater. Maybe that was the reason she'd survived a week without food. 

It wasn't that she didn't have food or have money for food it was quite simply that she didn't want to eat. It made her feel sick. 

She wasn't really sure how long she'd been walking, bouts of unconsciousness and the return of her narcolepsy made it difficult to keep track of time. 

The dark smudges under her eyes were back, only now the sickly bruises that still covered her skin complimented them. Her discolored flesh combined with her now skeletal appearance probably made anyone that saw her think that she had some hellish disease and kept them away. That was good. She did have a disease. It was poison. 

Black spots swam before her eyes. She ignored them. She was glad for them. The pain and the constant battle for consciousness as well as the rumblings ripping at her stomach gave her something to focus on.

They prevented her thoughts, prevented the nightmare from resurging behind her eyes. It was an old nightmare, one she'd had since the fight with Orochimaru. It was worse now though, there were more people in it now. And there was no one else here to drive the nightmare away.

The black spots continued to get worse and her brain seemed to turn to cotton again.

"Damn" was all she managed to mutter before collapsing into the mud.

~~~

Again she heard the beep. That damn beep that always shattered the sounds in her mind. She didn't want to wake up; she never wanted to wake up again. It was so nice to be dead.

She wasn't alone when she was dead.

Kakashi was there when she was dead.

"Ah, she's coming around." A distorted voice said. 

Her eyes forced themselves open against her will. Apparently her body wanted to be awake even if her mind didn't. Her body wanted to keep moving as far away from here as possible.

"Good afternoon miss." Said a cheerful doctor. She didn't respond.

"You're lucky one of the nurses spotted you on their way over. You have some bad infections in some of these cuts and your stitches need to removed." The doctor was saying in a lighthearted fashion.

She remained mute.

"You're from out of town, correct?" he asked.

She looked at him and nodded briefly.

"Where am I?" she asked in a low voice.

"You're in the Sunshine Hospital in the Cloud Country, near the southern border." He responded cheerily as he grabbed a large binder from a shelf.

_{I figured as much…}_

"Seeing as you're from out of town, would you mind taking a look at this?" he asked as he handed her the binder.

"What it is?" she asked suspiciously.

"Its essentially a list of all the John and Jane Does in the hospitals around the country. Our hospitals are all connected and government run. Our country is a really good hiding place for a lot of people so we often come across random injured people. If they're unconscious, we take a picture and make a description and send them to all the other hospitals. We then ask anyone from out of town who comes in to see if they can identify some of the people in the book." He explained.

She nodded. That was actually a kind of interesting idea. 

She flipped it open, scanning page after page of random people. The book was organized by year. She got to the list of people discovered three years ago and continued to flip, not really paying much attention anymore.

She flipped another page and froze her eyes widening. It was he. 

"Excuse me, doctor, is this man still in the care of a hospital here?" she asked, afraid to let hope creep into her voice.

He took the book and scanned the page.

"Hmm, JD # 869. I'll go check." He said with a smile as he handed the book back to her and left the room.

She stared at the picture, her fingers running over the familiar shapes and markings. Down the scar on the left side of his face. 

"Yup, he's still in our care. Why, do you know him?" the doctor asked as he came back into the room.

"Yes…yes I do." She responded, eyes still glued to the picture.

"Well, he's been in a hospital in the far north of the country for over three years now. He's in a catatonic state, hasn't moved or reacted to anything since he showed up. I swear, he's lucky hospital service is free here or he'd have one hell of a bill if he wakes up." The doctor joked.

"Can you tell me how to get to this hospital?" she asked, her eyes serious and intense, a hint of hope and desperation coloring her voice.

"Of course, but before I do, you have to let me treat you." The doctor sighed.

She glared suddenly, how dared he interfere and keep her here longer? But he was right, he had said she would find him much further north; she needed to be in her best health possible.

She nodded in compliance.  

~~~

Well, that's it for now. I'm just going to take up a bit of space down here to respond to a few more review questions ^_^

Naruto fics I love that have inspired me: Many have noticed a few similarities between my fic and some other ones; I hope they only remind you of them though and you don't think I'm ripping them off. 

I really love Addiction by ph34R_tH3_CuT3_0N3s, Wasted Years by Mizerable and Another Wolf by coetzee b. They're all really incredible works and I love them.

For Kayoko, no I don't have an updating schedule. I just post as I write which is turning out to be about two chapters a day (with the exemption of Tuesday because I was studying for an exam). Umm…I'm thinking of ripping off an idea of coetzee b's, which is to use your live journal to share updates. Seeing as I don't really use my journal for anything, I'm thinking of starting to use it to brainstorm and post random writings that didn't make it into the story (so you can see the what might have beens I guess) and my livejournal can be found at thanks for the suggestion about the summary, I agree. I wrote it when the fic was still a one shot. It is rather lame isn't it? I'll fix it. ^_^

And thank you to wicked_innuendo for the tip about italics on FF.net. 

See you all in the next chapter ^_~

~ Tea Leaf


	8. Chrysanthemum

Disclaimer: Sorry folks, still don't own Naruto.

A/N: A shorter chapter…but to make up for it I have artwork to be found at: mediaminer . org / fanart / view . php / 162165 . (if on FF.net, you'll have to remove the spaces) 

It's just a small and very simple image I did a few days ago and scanned and uploaded a little earlier today. It doesn't have much to do with the actual fic but is inspired by it. 

To fanartist: About the gypsies, why does the government care about them? They don't care about the gypsies per say, they care about the fact that roughly 30 people were brutally murdered and mutilated and that the person that did it is still at large. Seeing as it happened in the Fire Country, it's up to the Fire Country and so the Konoha shinobi to deal with it.

Sailor Tiamat: I mean poison both figuratively and literally and what I mean by that will become clearer as the story goes on.

Also, the lyrics slipped into this chapter are from the song "Chrysanthemum" by Everclear. It's an awesome song and I highly recommend it.

Thanks again to everyone who's reviewed and thought enough about it to comment and question, I hope you like the new chapter and look forward to reading your reactions ^_^

~~~

The Butterfly: Chapter 8

By: Tea Leaf / Banana Soap

~~~

Sasuke felt like the rain was never going to end. He'd managed to pick up Sakura's trail by accident after spotting some discarded gauze at the base of a tree on the north side of the town. There had been bloodstains on the gauze and the pattern suggested it had been wrapped around her head.

That had worried him. If her head was still bleeding that could lead to serious complications in regards to her mental capacities. She could have lost consciousness too and could be stranded, dying out there in the woods somewhere.

He'd almost panicked at the thought but Gaara's words had come back to him.

_"You underestimate her."_

He'd packed up his things and taken off after her almost immediately. 

Her trail, though cold was still easy enough to find. She'd made her own path through the heart of the woods, heading directly north. Because it was an original trail, it hadn't been disturbed much.

He'd gone slower than he would have liked but he'd wanted to keep his eyes on the trail. 

She was limping. Her weight was being supported mainly by her left leg. Understandable, her right one was broken after all. 

About two days on the trail, her footing started to become unsteady, often swaying. Then he found a body imprint in the grass. It was the first one he'd seen and it looked like she'd collapsed rather then stopped to rest. 

But then the trail continued. And the rain had started.

Every now and then he came across a deep footprint from when she had slipped in the mud but the rain that was still pouring was quickly washing them away.

He wasn't worried though, he knew Sakura and she always moved in straight lines until something pushed her to a different direction. So he kept going north. He stumbled across a few more abandoned bandages and indentations formed from collapse seemed to be becoming more and more frequent. 

And now he found himself at another one. 

The rain was pouring down on him but he ignored it as he examined the scene.

It was different; the indentation was larger, as if she'd been moved while she was unconscious and there were no telltale deep handprints that showed that she had showed herself back to her feet again. 

Someone else had found her and taken her somewhere.

The logical guess was a hospital, he was pretty sure a good number of her injuries must have been aggravated at this point. Probably infected. 

_{She probably didn't care…}_

~~~

The rain poured down. It had started raining when she'd left the hospital two days ago and hadn't stopped yet. 

The doctor had told her she'd come in the middle of the rainy season so it probably wouldn't stop again for at least another week. 

The ground was slippery.

She kept away from the roads and trails as well as any means of transportation other than her two feet. She didn't want to run into other people. She didn't want to come into contact with other people.

She was in a forest; most of the terrain here was forest. 

Her breathing was labored, her limbs were exhausted but she kept moving. She hadn't stopped moving since she'd left the hospital.

She couldn't stop, not when she was this close. Not when she was still this far away.

Her right leg slipped in the mud and she cried out as she fell on the broken limb, jarring her broken rib in the process. She'd landed at the foot of a tree and leaned back against it only to wince as the still tender wound at the back of her head made contact with the wood. 

She tried, but she couldn't get back up. She couldn't move.

The rain poured in fat droplets, sliding down her already damp skin. 

She was desperate, she knew. She was pathetic.

At least it was raining. The butterflies didn't fly in the rain.

She couldn't hurt things when it rained.

_//Yes I hate the way I feel _

_And it makes no sense//_

She continued to breathe heavily as she sat, getting soaked. 

What was she doing? 

She was making some desperate mad dash to the side of some comatose John Doe in the north through the most bitterly hostile weather. 

She wasn't even sure it was him. She almost didn't want it to be him because it made her all the more pathetic.

For three years, she'd been sitting at home rotting when all along he'd been waiting to be found and helped. 

She was so useless. After he had tried so hard to help her she hadn't even tried to look for him.

And as luck would have it, it wouldn't even have been that hard to find him if she had.

She blinked back the bitter tears that stung her eyes. She was not going to pity herself. 

She was _angry_ with herself. She was so stupid and useless. First she'd said those stupid things to Sasuke. Then she'd stupidly trusted a bunch of traveling vagrants. And then she'd stupidly allowed herself to be drugged and gotten beaten up and probably would have been raped had she not stupidly summoned those damn butterflies and stupidly killed everyone. 

_{Oh god…}_ her inner self whimpered as she suddenly felt swamped in guilt, as her tears finally spilled over, mixing with the rain.

And once she started, she just couldn't stop. 

All those people, all of them twisted and mutilated and all because of her.

The tears just kept coming and coming and she was suddenly overwhelmed with everything.  With her physical pain, her heart ache, her guilt, her misery, her depression. 

As if the images from the city of corpses weren't enough every painful moment from the past seven years reared their ugly heads to torment her as well.

And then that night came back to haunt her again and made it all worse.

Seven years and she still couldn't move on.

//_Five months gone and all I've got are_

_Pretty pink flowers on a chain link fence//_

She pulled a kunai out of her pouch without thought, as the rain and tears continued to blind her, and stabbed it through her arm.

She snapped out of her hysteria and looked down at the wound. The kunai went straight through her forearm, protruding from both sides of her flesh.

It was bleeding. The rain diluted the blood, making it seem like there was more. She sighed. 

She was such an idiot. She really had to get a grip. Things were only going to get harder, that's all they ever did.

 //_And I don't like what it means _

_'Cause I know _

_There is more to come.//_

Her breathing calmed and her tears slowed but didn't stop. She raised her left knee and rested her now injured left arm on it. She didn't touch the kunai.

Her right leg lay stretched out and she was really glad she had splints instead of a cast.  A cast would be far more work.

_{Thank the seven mad gods for small mercies…}_ her inner self commented sardonically.

"Yeah…small mercies…" she answered herself.

But what about large mercies? 

Kakashi was waiting for her in a hospital just another four days north. 

He was alive after all and he hadn't abandoned her. He hadn't abandoned her.

_//I can't go home without chrysanthemum//_

~~~

_//I walk around lost _

_And I don't know why.//_

Sasuke found the nearest hospital and showed the receptionist a picture that had been taken of team 7 after he had returned to the village and Sakura's wounds had finally healed up.

Yes, she'd seen the girl. She'd left 4 days ago. He was getting closer.

The receptionist paged the doctor that had treated her. 

"Hello, welcome to the Sunshine hospital, I hear you are inquiring about one of our Jane Doe patients." The doctor said as he walked towards him with a pleasant smile.

"Jane Doe?" he questioned.

"Yes, I never did manage to get her name. It was all we could do to get her to allow us to treat her after she saw that picture." The doctor continued in a humorous tone.

"Picture?" he questioned again.

"Oh yes, we had her take a look at our book of John and Jane Does and she looked like she would faint after spotting one of our older ones." The doctor responded congenially.

Sasuke frowned, who could she have possibly seen? He held out the by now heavily creased group picture.

"Is this the girl who was in here?" he asked pointing to the pink haired 16-year old in the picture. It had been the most recent one he had of her.

"Oh yes, that's here all right, only happier and less beat up and not as skeletal of course.  And isn't that funny! That's the John Doe she recognized!" The doctor exclaimed as he pointed to Kakashi.

_//I don't see the faces, _

_Or the places _

_That I should recognize.//_

"What? This man is in your hospital?" Sasuke asked, stunned by the discovery.

"Well, not our hospital as in this one but another branch of our hospital further north." The doctor responded jovially. 

He was in shock, Kakashi had been alive all this time and no one had found him. 

_{The nins Tsunade sent out couldn't have looked all that hard.} _he thought angrily. 

"And you're sure that she went to find him?" he asked, he needed to be sure as well.

"Oh yes, definitely. Do you require the address?" the doctor asked with an amused gleam in his eyes.

"Heh, yeah, that would be greatly appreciated." Sasuke responded in a slightly sardonic tone. 

~~~

_//It's like that dream _

_Where it feels like home _

_But it don't look right//_

This was too coincidental. It felt off. The doctor had been too forthcoming with his information. It was too convenient that Sakura had suddenly stumbled upon Kakashi's trail after 3 years of his disappearing without a trace.

And it was too easy that he'd fallen upon them both and was only a few days behind.

But still he went on. If something was up, she probably wouldn't be in any kind of a state to notice after that massacre and discovering Kakashi.

_//Yes I will look everywhere tonight//_

 He'd debated between taking the main roads and getting there faster but decided to follow her cold and fading but still clear trail through the northern woods. 

The doctor had told him that she was fairly weak since she hadn't been eating and because of her injuries. If something happened to her, he needed to know as soon as possible. Too many things could go wrong if he simply waited at the north hospital.

_//I will not stop until I make things right//_

The rain was still pouring, and it would pour probably until he made it too the hospital.

He hated the rain; it was washing away her trail. It was washing her away.

_//I can't go home until I see the sun//_

~~~

_I can't go home without chrysanthemum._

_No I can't go home without chrysanthemum._


	9. Gravity

Disclaimer: No Naruto still isn't mine I'm just borrowing the characters for this story.

A/N: heh heh, you guys will hate me at the end of this [evil grin] but it sets up this awesome scene I've got planned for the next chapter. 

Umm, I'm pretty sure they don't have Pink Floyd music in the Naruto world, I'm not even sure they have great sound systems and CDs, but for the sake of the flashback…bear with me please ^^() it just worked well so I put it in anyway.

Another song that works really well with this chapter is "Gravity" by Maaya Sakamoto and is from the Wolf's Rain soundtrack. I tried to fit the words it but it didn't work…oh well.

To Sailor Tiamat: About Chrysanthemum. A chrysanthemum is a type of flower that is said to bring longevity. In the song by Everclear, the protagonists is on a desperate search for this plant which one could extrapolate to say is symbolic of not only longevity but of truly living. In the case of the last chapter, the chrysanthemums become allegories for Sakura's need to find Kakashi, and Sasuke's need to find Sakura. 

Thank you to everyone who reviewed chapter 8, hope you all enjoy this new chapter and I'll see you in the next one ^_~

~~~

The Butterfly: Chapter 9

By: Tea Leaf / Banana Soap

~~~

The rain felt good. She was resting again or rather, her body had collapsed again. She nibbled on some food. She hated it. It was like ash in her mouth but she chocked it down anyway. She couldn't die from hunger now, not when she was this close. 

Tomorrow, tomorrow she'd arrive. 

Her stomach knotted as she swallowed another dry bite of some anonymous food. Her gut clenched painfully. It wasn't used to food.

She felt sick. Her head was spinning. She leaned back against the tree she was "resting" at. Her left leg was upraised, her left arm resting on the knee. Her right leg was stretched out in front of her, its bonds were becoming painfully tight. It was swollen. She suspected she might have broken it more. But she wasn't focused on that wound.

She was staring at her left forearm. More specifically at the kunai still imbedded in it. The edges of the wound were full of puss and dirt; the area surrounding it was an angry red. It was obviously badly infected.

Still she didn't touch the kunai. 

The swimming in her head turned to spinning and the blankness turned to fog as black spots obscured her vision familiarly. 

She was really sick. 

She heaved forward then as her stomach rejected the food it had been demanding from her for days, expulsing the ash onto the ground between her knees.

Dry heaves wracked her fragile frame and her brittle bones rattled with the motion. Her broken rib screamed bloody murder in the form of pain.    

Eventually the heaves subsided and she rested with her head between her now both upraised knees. Her elbows rested on her leg joints as her hands held back the straggly strands of hair that had fallen loose from the braid the nurses at the hospital had given her.

She was so pathetic. She was falling apart.

She wanted to rise, she wanted to keep moving forward but every time she collapsed it got harder and harder to get back up. It was harder and harder to take that first step.

She was so close and she was terrified. 

What if it wasn't him? What if it was? What would she say? 

She closed her eyes and leaned back again, grateful for the rain that drowned out the smell of vomit and so kept her from repeating the exercise.

She closed her eyes and lifted her face to the rain.

She had to go. 

He needed her; she could feel it in her gut, in her heart, in her mind. The closer she got the stronger the pull. Like gravity. 

He was calling her, she was sure of it.

She placed her hands behind her, bracing herself on the trunk of the tree and pushed herself to her feet again. She managed a half step before she crumbled to the ground again.

The black spots were blinding her. 

Again she tried to push herself back up but this time she didn't even make it to her feet before she collapsed again.

The pain was gone now. She'd finally gone blind.

~~~

She smiled suddenly as she pulled a CD out of his extensive collection. It was a single. Pink Floyd, Another Brick in the Wall. 

Her grin widened as she placed it into the elaborate sound system.

Her teacher had pathetically outdated technology when it came to everything else, but his stereo was top of the line. 

_{Who would have thought he liked music so much…must go well with his reading}_ her inner self had commented, her tone laden with innuendo. 

Her outer self chuckled gently as she pressed play.

Who would have thought her teacher would like a song about the uselessness of the school system and of teachers. 

The chopper sound effects started then the yelling, then the drums, then the bass and the electric guitar.

Her head started to move with the sinister beat as she continued to browse the CDs of which he had hundreds. 

"We don't need no education…" she sang along as the music moved to its signature mellow motion.

"We don't need no thought control."

"No dark sarcasm in the classroom"

"Teachers leave them kids alone…"

"HEY! Teacher! Leave those kids alone!" she sang a little louder as the band shouted it.

"Well if you insist." Came a voice from behind her and she turned around in surprise to see Kakashi standing in the entranceway with his arms crossed and his visible eyebrow raised.

 "Ah! Kakashi-sensei!" She said in an embarrassed tone as she blushed. 

"Umm, welcome home?" she half asked with a nervous smile.

"Hmph." Was his only response as he came fully into the room and walked over to the sound system.

To her surprise, instead of turning it off, he turned it up.

"If you're going to listen to Floyd, at least do it at the proper volume" he said as the speakers blasted and he sang along to the chorus of "Hey teacher! Leave them kids alone!" (now sung by children in the song) and he bopping his head to the beat as well.

"All in all, you're just another brick in the wall"

She couldn't help it. She just started laughing.

~~~

He was practically flying through the trees as he made use of all the speed he'd gathered over the years. 

His sharingan eyes were activated, heightening his senses and making it easier to spot Sakura's trail below him on the ground. 

The trail was clearer now; he was catching up to her. She couldn't be more than two days ahead of him now.

For the first time, he was almost glad she was injured seeing as it was really slowing her down and was making her trail easier to follow.

~~~

Shikamaru sighed as he stared at his clipboard.

It hadn't been easy, it had been downright life threatening, but they'd done it.

Through a series of conditioning experiments conducted on the butterflies as well as dissection and a lot more biology than he ever wanted to do again, they had finally proven it.

The butterflies did think independently and they were not a typical summoning animal, as in they weren't part of a separate realm of more powerful and godlike animals. Such as Gamabunta and his various underlings that Jiraiya and Naruto summoned.

They were just normal insects.

However, it did appear that they were connected in a kind of hive mind sort of way. The thing was though that there didn't appear to be any sign of one "queen" butterfly that controlled the rest. It was more like they were once one consciousness that had dissipated and spread evenly throughout all of the butterflies as they reproduced and their population grew. 

The mind had dissolved into basic instincts, the most prominent ones being possessiveness, self-preservation and protectiveness.

He had a huge report written up on how he believed that the butterflies must react to something in Sakura's blood (point figured from the now several dead young butterflies around the puddle of dried blood on the window sill of Sakura's old apartment).

The new tenant said that even though he'd cleaned the stain with bleach those butterflies kept coming back and so he had to keep the window shut all the time. 

He now firmly believed that Sakura didn't really control the butterflies at all. They had claimed her as their own and were very protective and possessive of her. 

Gaara had told him that often when he'd been with Sakura, butterflies had tried to land on him. He'd been protected due to the sand of course but they hadn't seemed to be attacking. It was more like they were trying to subtly kill him and make it look like an accident.

Shikamaru had thought Gaara was just being paranoid.

Gaara thought the butterflies could act out of jealousy.

Regardless, his mission was over and it had brought the results he'd expected. 

_{Today is good day} _he mused to himself as he made his way to the Hokage tower.

~~~

The last bars of the song faded from her mind, as did the fog faded from her brain.

She didn't move for a long moment after regaining consciousness.

Finally she opened her eyes. It was still raining but it was dark out. She must have been out for several hours.

At least her body was slightly rested now and she could keep moving.

She pushed herself to her feet, ignoring the jarring pain from her arm, ribs and leg, and started walking again.

She had to keep going.

~~~

Tsunade frowned over Shikamaru's report. This really changed everything.

If anything, it proved that Sakura was even more dangerous than originally thought because she wasn't even the one in control.

She sighed as she dropped the report on her desk and leaned back. 

She had to get a message to Sasuke somehow but she had no idea where he was and the trail would be long gone by now. She'd just have to hope his head was on straight when he found her (and she didn't doubt for a minute that he would find her) and so didn't kill her but simply brought her back.

_{Phh, you've got better odds of Orochimaru coming back to life and apologizing}_ her inner self sneered.

"Ugh…remind me why I took this job?" she muttered.

"Because in all honesty, you have nothing better to do with your time." A deep voice answered from the door. She could hear his smirk.

She looked up and glared at him.

Jiraiya grinned at her.

"What do you want?" she asked sulkily. 

"Do I really need a reason to visit with my favorite childhood teammate?" he asked, feigning a wound from her words.

"Yes." She answered sarcastically. 

His face fell and he gave her an annoyed look and sat down.

"Fine. Yes I do have a reason for being here." He responded in a childish, annoyed tone.

"What?" she said, also annoyed.

"About that girl…the little one. Are you sure Gaara's the right person to take care of her?" he asked. 

She sighed.

"No, I'm not sure. But he's sure and I trust him." She responded.

"Any word from the Uchiha kid yet?" he asked.

"No, nothing from him or Sakura. Why do you care?" she asked suspiciously.

"Honestly, I don't. But that blonde kid does and its distracting him from his work." Jiraiya answered as he stood.

Tsunade sighed again. Even Naruto was off kilter now.

~~~

He paused to examine the scene. She'd been here, probably less than a day ago. She'd collapsed under the tree.

There was more vomit. It hadn't all washed away yet.

She really was sick. He frowned as worry coiled in his stomach. 

She'd tried to get up but she'd collapsed again only a few feet away. There was a deep indentation in the undergrowth. She'd lain here a long time, sever hours at least. 

She'd lost consciousness.

She was getting worse again.

He took off, forcing his body past its limits as he pushed for more speed.

~~~

She stood there for a long time. The hospital was ten meters in front of her and her feet were frozen to the spot. 

This was it. 

She bit her lip and took a deep breath through her nose and finally took a hesitant step forward.  

And then another. And another. And suddenly she was running, heedless of her body's protest.

At the door she hesitated again, but only for a second.

She rushed to the counter.

"I…I need to see…John Doe…869…" she forced out. She was out of breath and her voice felt awkward from so long without really using it. Her ribs ached with every breath.

The receptionist looked at her for a long time as though unsure whether to admit this filthy and infected girl.

There must have been some pleading desperation clearly visible in her face because finally the receptionist consented and gave her the room number.

She limped away from the counter, now that she was here, it seemed her broken leg had finally given up on her. She considered the elevator then took the stairs.

She was stalling, she knew. She couldn't help it.

She was nervous. She was scared. She was light-headed and her skin felt too warm. 

She limped to the sixth floor and eased the heavy door open with great difficulty.

She felt heavy. Her feet were dragging. Her limbs were falling limp. And still she moved on.

She came to the room and stopped. She swayed slightly. 

There was something in the back of her mind pleading her to come forward, almost ordering her.

Her hand was shaking violently as it reached for the knob and after several unsuccessful tries, finally turned it.

The door, now unlatched, lazily drifted open on silent hinges.

The curtains on the window were drawn, but it was in the predawn hours so everything would have been dark anyway.

A faint glow came from a few monitoring machines, they were the only source of light in the room, and a steady beep echoed gently through the darkness. There was a curtain hiding the bed. 

She limped over to it and her hand was still trembling so badly she could barely grasp it. 

Finally she did and she took a deep breath in an attempt to clear her head and calm her nerves. 

She only succeeded in sending a sharp pain through her torso as the breath disturbed her rib.

She pulled the curtain and with a noisy rattle it moved, revealing the bed.

~~~

He didn't pause, he didn't hesitate, he just kept running. He burst through the hospital door and ran to the desk.

With one hand he pushed his ANBU mask to the side, with his other he proffered the very worn and now water stained picture.

"Have you…seen her?" he ground out between labored breaths.

The receptionist looked stunned.

"Yes, she came in about ten minutes ago" she responded.

"Where is she?" he burst out, ignoring the emotions that swelled within him. He'd finally caught up.

"She went to room 689" She started but he was gone before she could finish, already bounding up the staircase, taking the steps three at a time.

He shoved the door open on the sixth floor and paused briefly to consult the signs on the wall for the direction of the room and rushed off again.

The door was open. 

He slowed. He walked silently to the door and looked in. He froze.


	10. Oblivion

Disclaimer: Naruto is copyrighted to someone else, I'm just a poor fangirl with too much time on her hands so please don't sue.

A/N: Well, here's chapter 10. I'm not sure it came out right and I conveyed Sakura's breakdown properly…let me know what you think about it ^_^ As for tomorrow, I have an exam in the afternoon (hurray for crazy university exam schedules…) so the morning will be spent studying so I probably won't be able to update until late and it'll only be one chapter. As for Sunday, I've got to clean the house top to bottom so once again, it may only be one chapter. Well, wish me luck for the exam, it'll be "Great Philosophers" ugh .

~~~

The Butterfly: Chapter 10

By: Tea Leaf / Banana Soap

~~~

She was there. Or at least he thought it was her. He barely recognized her.

Her pink hair was matted with dry blood and mud and though there had once been an effort to pull it into a braid most of the hair had come loose since then. 

She was skeletal. Her clothes were just barely hanging onto her. 

Her left leg was bound and splinted.

Her back was too him. She didn't notice him.

She was staring at the bed.

~~~

Tears pricked at her eyes as she stared at the figure lying on the bed. He was so pale, like a corpse.

But his chest rose and fell steadily and the beeping assured her of his heart beat. 

She was shaking. 

He was here; all along he'd been right here waiting for her while she, stupid girl, had been waiting for him at home. 

He'd needed her and she'd never come.

She still couldn't believe it.

Her trembling hand reached out and gently her fingertips touched his warm cheek. 

As soon as her skin made contact, an angry crimson and black pattern flared across his skin and his heart rate accelerated.

She pulled her hand away as her eyes widened and hysteria swamped her.

That was the butterfly pattern. That was their poison. That was her poison.

Her poison put him here.

She put him here.

Her jaw went slack and her eyes went wild as she jumped backwards, stumbling and finding support on the wall.

Sasuke stared from the doorway. Kakashi was on the bed. Sakura was having some kind of breakdown.

She hit the wall and turned trying to claw her way deeper into the corner of the room.

It was her fault. It was all her fault. Everything was her fault. She was poison. Her skin was poison. She poisoned everything around her.

"Sakura, calm down!" he said as he tried to grab hold of her.

"Don't touch me!" she screamed as she crumpled into a ball in the corner.

" I'm poison…I'm poison" she started muttering in a feverish mantra as she tried to crawl into the space between the wall and the floor.

"Sakura—" he tried to reach for her again but again his hand was hit away.

"Don't touch me! My skin's poison!" she exclaimed brokenly as she hit blindly at his hand and started shaking convulsively as still she clawed at the corner.

"You're not poison!" he growled as he grabbed her in a bear hug from behind.

She cried out in sudden pain as he aggravated her ribs and he resisted the urge to let go immediately. She needed to listen to him and calm down. He didn't want to hurt her but he knew it would help her focus.

She was so small; he could feel the bones in her back as he pulled her against his chest. She felt like she'd break if he held even fractionally tighter.

"Yes I am." She whimpered.

"Sakura listen to me. Your skin isn't poisonous." He said evenly and clearly.

She shook her head and kept shaking it. He turned her around and caught hold of her left hand and held it to his face, holding it there with his right hand as his left reached out to cup her face as well and force her to face him.

"Sakura look at me." He ordered as he gently forced her chin up. Her eyes were wide and feverish, a wild fear still tainting them. She didn't meet his eyes.

"Look at me" he ordered again in a more forceful tone. Her eyes met his briefly and kept dancing away but back again.

"Look Sakura, you're not poison. You're not hurting me." 

Her breathing started to calm.

"Look. Nothing's happening." 

She looked at him then. Her hand rested on his cheek and nothing was happening and his hand rested on her cheek and still nothing was happening.

The wildness calmed but the fever in her eyes remained. That's when he noticed how warm her skin was.

His eyes shifted to the hand he was holding to his face and finally noticed the kunai sticking through her forearm and the raging infection surrounding it. He pulled back, shocked at the wound until his eyes took in the huge web of scars that covered the pale skin. He grabbed her other arm and found a matching web.

A lot of these scars were old. 

His breathing quickened as he finally got a good look at her. She looked starved and her eyes stared out from deeply shadowed hollows. She hadn't been sleeping.

Her cheeks were gaunt and there was a red scar over her right eye. His eyes lowered only to find wound after wound. 

Suddenly he gave a sharp tug on her arms, which shifted her off balance and sent her tumbling into him.

His arms wrapped around her so tightly she cried out again but his arms wouldn't loosen.

How could he have let this happen to her?

There was a commotion at the door as suddenly several members of the medical staff burst in to investigate the commotion. 

The head doctor saw that the John Doe patient was fine but in the corner of the room a man and woman were huddled together. The man looked like he'd just seen a ghost, all the color had drained from his face and his eyes looked haunted. The woman in his arms was unconscious.

"What happened?" the doctor asked.

The man looked lost and couldn't answer, he picked up the girl and showed her to them.

The nurse brought a hand to her mouth to stifle her gasp as she laid eyes on the battered and broken form. 

"This way." The doctor said as he turned out of the room. The nurse followed, as did Sasuke.

~~~

It had been three days now and she was still out cold. He hadn't moved from her bedside.

It was all his fault. He should have done something to help her a long time ago. He should have noticed how much she needed help a long time ago. He should have treated her better a long time ago and then she wouldn't have needed help at all.

He was so useless. 

No matter what he did, no matter how strong he became, he still couldn't protect anyone who meant anything to him. 

~~~

She sat at the window staring out at the rain. Her sight was blurred from the tears she was trying to hold back.

"Sakura?" a voice questioned softly from behind her.

She didn't answer.

She sensed his hand come near her back.

"Please don't touch me…" she said softly.

The hand hovered near her back for a moment then retreated.

"What's wrong?" he asked as he leaned against the wall beside the window.

She stayed quiet for a long time. But he was patient.

"I happened again…" she answered eventually.

"What happened again?" 

"Someone…someone screamed again." She answered.

Kakashi pressed his lips together and exhaled softly. Ever since the fight against Orochimaru, people had been afraid of her. More specifically, of coming into physical contact with her. Something that for she, who was a very physical person, was incredibly isolating. 

"What happened?" he asked gently.

"I was walking and I bumped into someone and knocked them over by accident. I offered my hand to help them up and then…then they screamed at the sight of me. Everyone was starring. And the kid was shaking and even started to cry. And Sasuke and Naruto were there…and they just starred…everyone just starred…and I ran…." She answered in a low, dead voice.

He didn't like that voice. 

He crouched down beside her and wrapped his arm around her shoulders, pulling her against him.

~~~

"Hi." She said with a small smile.

Gaara looked up at the voice.

"Where you talking to me?" he asked as he raised a suspicious eyebrow.

"Yes, I was." She answered as she took the few steps to his side and sat down with him in the long grass.

"Why?" he asked again, still on the defensive.

"Why not?" she countered as she looked out over the field.

"Because I'm the evil demon from the desert?" he countered sarcastically.

"And I'm the big bad butterfly of Konoha. What's your point?" she asked as she met his gaze directly.

His eyes widened slightly and he blinked then turned away to look across the field.

"Hello." He replied.

She smiled.

~~~

"Oy, Sakura-chan! Time to get up!" 

"I don't wanna…" came her muffled reply from under the covers.

"We've got training." 

"You're always late for training." She countered.

"Not on purpose!" he responded with mock offense.

"Liar." She responded as she pulled a pillow over her head.

Kakashi glared in mock annoyance at the nest of blankets and then smirked behind his mask.

The sheets were suddenly ripped off her bed.

"Arg! Cold!" she exclaimed as she curled quickly into a ball, trying to conserve body heat as well as make herself small enough so that the pillow could be a blanket.

He grabbed the pillow and revealed her glare.

"You're sadistic." she muttered in mock-anger.

"Yeah, I get that a lot." He answered easily.

"Why do I have to go to training?" she asked mutinously. "Its not like you train me anyway…" she muttered under her breath.

Kakashi sighed.

"You're right." He answered.

"What?" she asked, half stunned by his sudden agreement but immediately suspicious.

"You're right. You can sleep. I've got work to do with the boys." He said as he walked out the door of her room.

"What?! You're leaving me behind? No! Wait!" she exclaimed as she jumped out of bed and sent her pajamas flying as she pulled on her training clothes.

Within seconds she was racing out the door of her room. Her hair was a mess still and her shirt was on backwards, but she didn't care. 

"I thought you wanted to sleep?" Kakashi asked innocently as he saw her.

She glared at him. 

He laughed.

"Your shirts on backwards and you forgot your bindings." He pointed out.

"Get ready, I'll wait. But you get to explain why we're late." He added smugly.

"Damnit. Fine! But don't leave without me!"

~~~

 _{but you did leave without me…}_

"Sakura, what are you doing?" a familiar voice asked her.

She was floating. 

She didn't hurt here. It was warm and dark. She liked it here.

"Sakura. You can't stay here" the voice came again.

"Why not?" she asked, annoyed that he was disturbing her.

"Because you don't belong here." He answered.

"I don't belong out there either." She answered.

"Of course you do." He responded.

"What about you? You stayed here." She answered bitterly.

"I'm stuck here." He answered her.

He became visible then. The pair of them were sitting cross-legged in the void, facing each other.

Their skin glowed softly in the darkness. Her scars were gone.

"Why are you stuck here?" she asked him.

"I don't know. That's why you need to wake up though so you can find out." He answered.

"I can't." 

"Why not?" he was humoring her.

"I just can't. I kill people. I can't help them." She said weakly as she looked away.

"That's bull and you know it." He answered frankly.

She looked back at him, she felt like a little kid being scolded.

"So, why not?" he asked again.

She glared at him and didn't answer.

He waited, watching her with his heavily lidded eye, the sharingan one being closed completely.

She snapped.

"Because I don't want to! I'm sick of it out there! Its just pain and misery and then more pain and more misery. And it never stops! And I can't take it anymore!" she exploded.

He smiled.

"Now there's my Sakura! And here I thought you'd disappeared along with me three years ago." He answered.

She snapped her mouth shut and looked away.

"What happened to you?" she asked quietly.

"It's a long story. I'll tell you when I wake up." He answered her.

She glared at him.

"And when will that be?" 

"At the very least, after you decide to wake up." 

"Why should I?" she questioned.

"Because people are waiting for you. People need you." 

"Who?" 

"Wake up and find out." He answered with a smirk.

She glared at him again.

"How do I wake up?" she asked reluctantly.

"Easy, just open your eyes." He responded.

~~~

She blinked and found herself staring at a ceiling.

_{Bastard…damn him and his stupid obvious answers…}_ her inner self commented sarcastically.

She groaned as all the familiar aches and pains came back to her.

_{Stupid broken body…}_

"Sakura?" came a gravelly voice from beside her. 

She looked over.

Sasuke was staring at her, shock or something similar in his eyes.

She tried to glare but her muscles were too tired.

"How do you feel?" he asked, at a loss for anything else to say.

She gave him a "of all the stupid questions to ask…" look.

"What are you doing here? What am I doing here? Where is here?" she asked then, her voice raspy and dry as she looked away from him and back to the ceiling.

"You're in a hospital and I'm sure you can feel why." He answered.

She smirked slightly. 

_{Ah…good old Sasuke the Sarcastic…}_

He hadn't told her why he was here but the ANBU uniform was clear enough.

He was here because of the gypsies.

She bit her lip and closed her eyes briefly at the thought of the mutilated tribe.

_{What had happened that night?}_

She groaned as she sat up then and Sasuke's hands were on her shoulder's, trying to push her back down.

"Let go of me." She said coldly as she glared at him.

He glared back.

"No, you've been in a coma for 6 days, you can wait another few hours for the doctor's ok before you start moving again." He answered.

She sighed. She really didn't want to fight with him right now so with a glare she lay back down.

"After the doctor clears you, we're taking the train back to the fire country and going back to the village." He told her monotonously.

"What?" she snapped mutinously.

"You heard me." 

"no." 

He raised his eyebrow, daring her to try anything but complying with his dictate.

She growled at him, maybe if she were in top form she could have but not when she was this injured.

"Kakashi will be coming too of course, hopefully Tsunade-sama will be able to do something for him." He continued.

Her eyes widened.

"Kakashi?" she asked.

"Don't you remember?" 

She looked at the ceiling again, she didn't answer. 

"I'm not surprised" he answered, his voice softer as he guessed her answer. "You had a really bad head injury and then you got really sick from infection. You've been constantly slipping in and out of consciousness for the past three weeks." 

_{So he's been following me…}_ The thought came but she felt disconnected from it, her eyes were drooping shut. 

Sasuke waited for her eyes to open again. Her breathing slowly grew even and her eyes remained closed.

He sighed. He should have expected her to fall asleep.


	11. The Space Between

Disclaimer: Naruto and its characters are copyrighted to its creators etc. In other words, not mine.

A/N: Thank you to everyone who's reviewed the past to chapters and special thanks to Kayoko for the beautiful butterfly wallpaper she made for the story (which is up here:  and for those on FF.net, the link is in the comments from the april 21st entry in my livejournal anotherstraycat) and for the comments about the last scene in chapter 10. I agree and so chapter ten has been modified. Also thanks to Mint for the luck on my exam, it went great ^_^.

In random news, I picked up the first two mangas of Alice 19th, the latest NA release of Watase Yuu (creator of Fushigi Yuugi and Ayashi no Ceres, both are all time favorites of mine) and it is awesome! I love Frey, he's so funny! It has a few of her trademark plot moves but its really really good and funny and I highly recommend that everyone else go read it. 

Okay, on with the new chapter, it's a shorter one but I think it turned out pretty good. Oh, and the song "Motorcycle Drive By" is by Third Eye Blind (whom I also love…) Also, the memory Sasuke refers too was written in a deleted scene that's in my LJ in case there's anyone who can't wait for it to be explained later in the story. Anyways, enjoy and remember to please review, I live for feedback ^_^

~~~

The Butterfly: Chapter 11

By: Tea Leaf / Banana Soap

~~~

She sat across from him, her left leg was raised and her foot rested on the seat. She was resting her chin on her knee as she leaned against the widow that was on her left side. Her left arm, heavily bandaged, was curled protectively around her stomach. Her gaze was empty as she watched the land speed by through the blur of the rain smashing against the glass. 

She'd been like this ever since the doctor had let her see Kakashi again. She'd touched his face again and this time he'd been able to see what happened. As soon as her skin had made contact the crimson and black pattern that covered the wings of the butterflies that followed her around had flared across the comatose patient's skin. The same pattern that had covered her skin--- but her cut that memory off before it surfaced.  That memory still gave him nightmares.

Kakashi was in another car with a nurse. She had wanted to sit with him but the hospital denied her, they didn't trust the reaction he had to her. And so she was here and he was sitting across from her. 

Now that he'd found her, he didn't want to let her out of his sight.

She'd regained some weight during her stay at the hospital but she was still too thin. He made sure she ate every meal.

Her infection had subsided but the doctor had prescribed some antibiotics just in case seeing as her health was weak at the moment. He made sure she took them twice a day.

He looked out the window.

Her eyes shifted over too him as he brooded across from her. He was making her feel like some helpless child in need of a caretaker.

Why he thought he should be that caretaker was beyond her.

His dark eyebrows were drawn together slightly, shadowing his coal black eyes as he frowned at some sight outside or some thought in his head.

Idly she wondered what he was thinking. She couldn't read him anymore. Not that she'd ever been very good at it but at least back then she'd felt like she new him.

She barely recognized him anymore. Not that he really looked all that different. He was bigger certainly, more heavily muscled, more prominent features but his hair was still about chin length and spiked in the back while his longish bangs still helped hide his face and his eyes were still as troubled as always though perhaps they were less focused now. 

But then the ANBU mask resting on the seat beside him and the uniform that covered his body reminded her that he was very different. He didn't wear the Uchiha symbol anymore.

She didn't recognize him because she simply didn't know him anymore. She was pretty sure they hadn't said more than a few short sentences to each other since he had returned to the village four years ago. Their last conversation was one she'd rather forget. 

He looked back at her and she held his gaze, for a brief moment she was vaguely curious as to who he had become over the years. But she was just too weary right now to ask. She looked back out the window.

He sighed inaudibly, he'd hoped for a second she'd say something. He was surprised how little she actually spoke now. He supposed she had been like this for a while, he simply hadn't noticed until now. 

There were a lot of things he hadn't noticed about her. 

She looked the same, now more than ever seeing as the only clean and undestroyed clothing she had left was her green shorts, mesh tank top and red and white cover dress.

This dress was different though. There was no with circle on the front, it had been removed and placed within the one on her back, creating a target that zeroed in on that spot between her shoulder blades where he knew that scar still disfigured her skin.

 Her hair was loose. It had been washed and brushed. It shone faintly in the dim lighting. It was longer than it had ever been before. He liked it long.

Her face was impassive, her gaze unfocused as she stared blindly and silently out the window. He followed her example.

The silence stretched as time passed them by. It was dark out. It was night. The rain was finally letting up. They were approaching the border.

He hadn't noticed when, but at some point he had fallen asleep. He'd had no dreams; it had simply been deep oblivion. 

But now a soft sound was pulling him awake. He opened his eyes just barely as looked across from him. 

She was still staring out the window; she didn't appear to have moved at all. Her eyelids were half shut and she looked like she was the closest she was likely to come to actual sleep. 

She was humming ever so softly. The sound barely escaping on her breath.

The tune sounded sad but it was an accepting kind of sad.

He opened his eyes fully. She didn't notice. She wasn't really aware of anything. He was pretty sure she wasn't even aware she was humming.

"What song is that?" he asked, his voice wasn't a whisper but it wasn't much above one either.

"It's called Motorcycle Drive By." She responded in the same tone before continuing.

He was surprised; he hadn't expected her to answer, especially not so readily. He wondered if it had something to do with that glazed look that told him she wasn't exactly awake.

"What's it about?"

"It's about a guy who's in love with this girl and he's always known it wouldn't work but he got involved anyway. And when it fades, he's not surprised or angry, he's just calmly accepting of it. He'd known it would happen all along." She answered.

He nodded slightly.

"I like it…" she continued.

His eyebrows raised slightly, he hadn't expected her to volunteer anything more than he asked.

"It's a sad song but it doesn't make you feel sad. You almost feel happy because by the end of it, he's happy." She continued softly.

"What happens at the end?" he asked.

"He dies…he drowns in the ocean." She answered.

The silence stretched for a moment, he felt that she had more to say.

"They say drowning is the most peaceful way to die." She said softly.

He didn't know how to respond and he felt that pain squeeze his lungs again, the same one that had seized him when he'd seen the scars on her arms. Something in the back of his mind was mortally offended that she had ever felt the need to learn about peaceful ways to die. 

"If you could chose, how would you like to die?" she asked her voice seeming vaguely hesitant as she continued to look out the window with those glazed eyes.

He frowned, some part of him again offended by the subject. She shouldn't be thinking of ways to die. But he didn't want her to stop talking so he thought for a moment before responding.

"Asleep in my bed as a very old man." He answered finally.

She smiled.

She actually smiled.

It was her soft, secret smile. The one she used when her thoughts were confirmed so accurately it was almost funny.

"I thought as much." She said in a soft and wispy voice. "A suiting revenge against your brother." 

He frowned at her, now feeling vaguely defensive.

"What do you mean?" he asked suspiciously.

Her smile crumbled and her eyes shifted downwards slightly.

"I'm sorry. Forget I said anything." She answered, her voice and eyes losing that dreamy quality. 

She was silent then.

~~~

It took them four days to get from the north of the cloud country back to the heart of the fire country on the train. The rest of the trip had been spent in silence. Never again did he catch her in that dreamy state; never again did he hear her humming some soft and melancholy tune. He never saw her actually asleep either but he figured she must have because though the faint bruises remained under her eyes, they never worsened.  

They disembarked at the station closest to the Konoha secret village and were met by several of the leaf shinobi. He had sent a messenger ahead of them to ask Tsunade for assistance. 

Kakashi was set on a stretcher and carried between two of the nins. Four ANBU guards escorted Sakura. He walked beside her.

It was a full day's walk from the train station to the village. 

She didn't say a word the entire way nor did she look anywhere but the ground or the sky. 

They were admitted to the village at sunset, Kakashi was brought straight to the hospital. 

Sakura froze at the gates and looked ahead.

A small, vaguely shameful smile tugged at the corner of her lips as she spotted Gaara there waiting. 

Again, his insides had clenched tightly and he'd had to fight off the glare that wanted to be aimed at the sand nin. 

Not that Gaara would have noticed though, his green eyes were glued to Sakura's.

He felt vaguely sick. 

He left her there and headed to the Hokage tower, she obviously had no need for his presence.

Her eyes shifted to Sasuke's back as he walked away and she sighed softly. 

Back in the village for not even a minute and already he was back to the same old habits.

She walked towards Gaara.

"Sakura nee-chan!" came a small voice from behind Gaara's leg. 

She looked down and her heart leapt into her throat as her green eyes met the large brown ones of the gypsy child.

She crouched down. "Mika-chan?" she asked quietly, half afraid she was hallucinating.

The little girl ran to her and threw her arms around Sakura's neck. Wonderfully real arms. She hugged her back tightly.

"Mika-chan was worried" the little voice came from its muffled source at Sakura's neck.

"Is Sakura nee-chan ok?" she asked as she looked up at her and examined the older girls face with watery eyes.

"Yes, I'm ok. Are you ok?" she asked then.

The little girl nodded.

"Gaara nii-san has been with Mika-chan." She answered as she looked up and over at Gaara.

Sakura looked up at him too and frowned slightly in confusion. He shrugged vaguely and she turned back to the little girl.

"Mika-chan, what happened?" she asked, unable to word the request more specifically.

Luckily, Mika understood her.

"The man were mean to you. And they hit you. And Mika-chan cried and tried to help but Mummy stopped Mika-chan. Then Sakura nee-chan falled down and stopped moving and Mika-chan was scared. But then the pretty flutterbys came and the man all falled down." She said.

"Pretty flutterbys…you mean butterflies? What butterflies?" she asked as she frowned.

"Those flutterbys." Mika responded as she pointed a small hand over Sakura's shoulder.

Sakura turned to look and froze.

There it was. A large crimson and black butterfly. The pattern glared angrily at her, reminding her that she caused that same pattern on Kakashi. The poisonous pattern. 

She hadn't seen one for weeks but then she remembered why. The rain. Butterflies couldn't fly in the rain.

The butterfly fluttered to Mika's outstretched hand. Sakura's instinctively flew up to knock it away just as a sudden apparition of sand did the same. The butterfly backed up, surprised.

"Why did yous do that?" Mika said with a pouty frown and tried to reach for the butterfly again.

"No Mika, you can't touch those butterflies, they're dangerous." Sakura said sternly as she grabbed the little girl's hands.

"No theys not! Theys touched Sakura nee-chan and Sakura nee-chan not hurt. They touch Mika-chan too and Mika-chan not hurt." The little girl exclaimed.

Sakura was stunned at the comment and the hand restraining the girl went limp. Mika took immediate advantage and reached for the butterfly again.

Thankfully, Gaara's sand reacted without his conscious thought and again the sand barrier blocked the butterfly.

"Mika, please don't touch those butterflies." He said gently as he crouched down beside her and Sakura.

"Okay…" the little girl consented as she moved from Sakura's limp grasp and wrapped her arms around Gaara's neck. Gaara held onto her with one arm as he stood and offered the other to the still shocked Sakura.

She grasped it limply and he helped her to her feet but didn't let go.

"Come on, you should go see the Hokage." He told her.

He took in her injuries as she stood and frowned slightly. But now was not the time to question her about her various bandages.

He tugged her along gently as he carried Mika, keeping his pace slow so that Sakura could keep up easily despite her bandaged leg.

Sasuke froze as he stepped out of the Hokage tower and saw them. Hid gut clenched again and that iron band around his lungs squeezed tightly. 

The looked just like some happy family.

He was too far away to see Sakura's expression but he pictured her smiling at Gaara and Gaara smiling back at her. His eyes narrowed dangerously. 

He turned and left.


	12. Sweet Tequila

Disclaimer: In case you've missed the past 11 chapters, I still don't own Naruto.

A/N: Thank you so much for everyone who's been reviewing and enjoying the story so far. I've been getting the most awesome reviews! You guys are great.  Just a few notes for this chapter, yeah I know Sakura and Sasuke are OOC later in the chapter…my excuse is that they're seriously drunk…and that they are conveniently happy drunks ^_^.

As for my livejournal, its is here: (for FF.net: livejournal. com /users / anotherstraycat).  My livejournal will be host to some brainstorming in regards to the fic as well as a spot for some discarded writing. I've also been ranting about my other artistic projects as well so if you're interested you can check those out as well. 

Hope you all enjoy the new chapter!

~~~

The Butterfly: Chapter 12

By: Tea Leaf / Banana Soap

~~~

Gaara gently tugged her into Tsunade's office after him. The closer she'd gotten to the tower, the more he'd had to pull her for each step. She didn't want to see Tsunade.

"Ah, Sakura. I was hoping you would stop by." Tsunade said deceptively pleasant as she entered the office.

"Please have a seat." The Hokage continued.

Sakura stood rooted to place for a second but then did as requested.

"Gaara, it's getting late. That little girl needs to be put to bed." Tsunade said then, her eyes never leaving the pink haired girl sitting in front of her.

Gaara's eyes narrowed but Tsunade was right, Mika was falling asleep on his shoulder.

"We'll talk tomorrow." He told Sakura as he laid his free hand on her shoulder.

She nodded once and he left the room.  

Tsunade's expression turned deadly serious when the door shut.

Sakura's eyes narrowed. 

"I'm sure you already know why ANBU was after you." The older woman stated bluntly.

She didn't respond.

"You are thought to be the murderess of 37 people." She continued.

Her facial muscles tightened slightly.

"However, new evidence has come to light that would suggest that the deaths were accidental and not caused by you at all." Tsunade told her, still poker faced.

Sakura frowned slightly.

"I expect that you'll be wanting to thank Shikamaru and Ino for figuring that out." 

She frowned more.

"Despite that, these are simply theories and not actual proof so you are still a suspect. You will remain in the village until the matter is resolved." The Hokage said as she stood and walked over to the shelf to the left of her desk.

She'd expected her to say that.

"Here." Tsunade said suddenly as she tossed something at Sakura. Her right hand rose instinctively and caught it.

She stared at it, frowning deeply in confusion at her leaf forehead protector.

"I am not a Konaha ninja." She said simply.

"No, no you're not. You haven't been for a few years now but that's my fault. It just looks better on you then on my shelf." Tsunade replied as she continued to gaze at the contents of her shelf.

"I won't wear it." She responded.

"I didn't think you would." 

Finally Sakura simply shrugged and stood up, slipping the band into her pocket.

"Stop by the hospital tomorrow after noon." Tsunade said then.

"Mm." She responded with a nod and left the room and the tower.

It was almost completely dark out now, the sun itself had sunk below the horizon but a few desperate streaks of color still played in the western sky. 

Her feet started shuffling towards her old apartment building. 

A brief conversation with the landlord informed her that her old apartment had been rented out and he had no vacancies.

She'd figured. 

She kept wandering. The moon was rising now, the sky being completely dark. She found herself on the bridge.

She sighed. 

She sat down on an edge, her feet dangling between the bars over the water below, as her forehead rested against the rails.

She should find a hotel. She didn't really want to get up though.

It was a warm night. She was comfortable here. Some fireflies were dancing over the river, glowing faintly in the darkness. 

She heard steps coming from the woods.

She didn't look over. 

He smiled to himself, he hadn't consciously expected to come here, but he was glad he had.

He came over and sat down beside her, his feet also dangling over the edge of the bridge. 

They sat there quietly watching the fireflies. She smiled softly. It was a nice moment.

"You can stay at my place if you want. I've got a spare bedroom." He said eventually, he'd checked her apartment hours ago.

Her smile faded as the moment passed. She didn't answer right away.

There had been a time when she would have cut off her arm for a chance to spend the night with Uchiha Sasuke at his house. But now…now she wasn't sure how she felt about it. 

It was a good idea…her apartment was gone, her money was short and she really didn't want to show up at anyone's door and impose her presence on them. 

Eventually she nodded.

"Thanks." She responded.

The sat there longer, enjoying the cooling night air and the sound of the rushing water. She liked it here. 

Finally he stood and held out his hand to her to help her to her feet. She took it and stood. 

He let go. 

He walked at his normal pace, and she limped as she tried to keep up. 

They reached his house and he opened the door and turned on the lights before going into the kitchen. She closed the door behind her and slipped off her sandals and set down her bag before following him into the kitchen.

He was pouring some anonymous liquid into a glass. She smelt alcohol and smirked as she leaned against the doorjamb. 

"Want one?" he asked before downing the shot. 

She considered for a moment. She hated drinking alone but she didn't mind when she was with someone else.

"Sure." She answered as she walked over and sat down at his low table. He brought the bottle and two shot glasses and sat down across from her. 

He filled one of the shots and handed it to her. She downed it easily. 

_{heh…tequila, straight}_ she wasn't surprised.

He refilled her glass and his. They drank together. He refilled them again…and again…and again…

And again until they were both feeling significantly better. She could no longer feel the throbbing ache in her leg and ribs, he could no longer feel that vise around his chest, and both were too light-headed to care about the darker thoughts that usually plagued them. 

He tried to fill the glasses again.

"Ah damn, its empty…" he muttered as he stared up the spout of the obviously empty bottle. A final drop let go then and landed in his eye. 

He cried out and started cursing fluently as he squeezed his eye shut and attempted to rub out the stinging pain. 

Across the table she laughed, softly at first but her laughed grew as he attempted to stand to get to the sink to wash it out only to fall straight on his face.

_{One tequila, two tequila, three tequila, floor!}_ her inner self chanted as she laughed.

The stinging eventually subsided as he managed to pull himself back to the table. 

He mock glared at her as she continued to laugh.

"Its not funny" he said, his words slightly slurred.

"Yes, it is" she responded with a huge grin.

He grinned back at her. 

She looked like a different person when she laughed, she looked like that person he used to know. Especially with the blush coloring her cheeks and the faint glow to her skin. Mind you, the blush was probably because she was drunk and the blurriness that he thought was a glow was probably because he was drunk too. 

"This is the first time I've seen you laugh in years…" he said then a little wistful as he rested his chin in his hand.

"Really?" she asked as she tilted her head to the side. Then she looked up as though trying to think of something.

"I guess that I just don't think a lot is all that funny anymore" she responded with a shrug. 

"You should go see comedians or something then, you look prettier when you're laughing." He stated it as if it were obvious, as he continued to stare at her in an unfocused way.

"Really? Hmm…had I know that I would have laughed more often."  She said as she crossed her arms on the table and rested her chin on them.

"You should." He said as his eyes shifted to her arms. 

His own reached out and grabbed them stretching them out. Her left one was still bandaged but her right one wasn't. He clumsily removed her bandage as she watched him curiously. He stared at the inside of her forearms.

She stared at them for bit too then looked up and stared at him questioningly.

"You don't hide them." He said bluntly.

"Why should I? I'm not ashamed of them." She answered easily.

"Why not?" he asked.

"Because they're proof that I'm real. That I'm flesh, not glass. That I'm human and not a butterfly…" she answered, her mirth long faded as a darkness crept over her features.

He nodded.

"I think they're pretty." She continued. "They give me texture and make my body unique."

"You're unique anyway." He said but she wasn't listening.

"They're like your tattoos only cheaper" she said then in an effort to lighten the mood and change the subject. 

He cocked his head to the side as he kept looking at them for a second and then looked up and saw her smiling at him. This was his chance! He smiled back.

Her smile widened and she leaned closer a bit. His widened as well and he moved in response. 

"I like it when you smile at me." She told him then.

"I like smiling at you." He answered. 

The both kept smiling, not really knowing what to say but not really caring either. They both kept leaning forward too but they didn't notice until they finally made contact.

It wasn't much of a kiss, just lips pressed against each other, neither really moving. 

They pulled back simultaneously, almost as if they had bounced off each other. 

But they stayed close.

"You know, I have been waiting forever for you to do that" she told him rather matter of factly. Her eyes were half closed and had a slightly glazed look to them. Her color was heightened.

He figured he must look rather similar right now.

"Really? Then maybe I should do it again." He answered her conversationally. 

She considered for a moment.

"Yes, I think you should." She agreed.

So he did.

Their mouths crashed together this time moving, licking, nibbling, sucking. Her hands moved of their own accord coming up and burying themselves in his hair at the back of his skull and holding him to her. His hands moved as well, one massaging her neck the other moving along her jaw and into her long pink hair. 

Neither was really sure how long they were locked to each other over the table and an empty bottle of tequila, neither honestly cared. 

This had been too long coming to spoil with timing. 

Eventually, their initial frenzy calmed and they simply savored, the textures, the taste. Committing everything to memory for future reference, setting the bar from which to measure anyone else who came after.

Eventually they moved apart again.

"That was nice." They said together, still so in tune to each other that they were speaking in synch. 

They sat back then, unsure of what to do now.

"I suppose we should get some sleep…" he said eventually. She nodded.

They stood, still a little wobbly from the alcohol and leaned on each other for balance as they made they're way shakily up the stairs. 

He showed her to the spare bedroom and she paused at the doorstep and stared in then bit her lip. It was so cold and dark…so impersonal…like a cave.

"What's wrong?" he asked, his voice clearer but still revealing intoxication.

"Can I sleep in your room?" she asked quietly.

He stared at her for a moment. 

"Sure." He said eventually and they went to his room. 

He grabbed a pair of pajama pants from a drawer and went into the on-suite bathroom to change. 

She frowned slightly to herself. She didn't have any pajamas. Then she shrugged. She'd just sleep in her underwear, no big deal. She stripped off her red dress, mesh top and shorts. Her chest was still heavily bandaged. She crawled into the bed. 

It was large and very soft and she snuggled in. He came out of the bathroom and saw her in the bed and crawled in on the other side, lying down on his back. She snuggled up to his side and curled her arm around his chest. 

His breathing stopped, hers slowed as she fell asleep almost immediately. He mentally shrugged as he closed his eyes and resumed breathing normally, they could sort this out in the morning.   


	13. Freudian Theory

Disclaimer: Naruto and all its characters are not mine. I'm just writing the story for entertainment purposes (i.e. I'm bored so writing to kill time) and am not making any kind of profit off this.

A/N: Hey everyone! Thank you so much for all the reviews you've been sending, they make me feel all warm and fuzzy inside, especially when people tell me that my story has influenced them in some way, be it uplifting a bad day, inspiring to read the Naruto manga or even changing the way you look at butterflies. This chapter is a bit of a filler chapter, you'll see what I mean when you read it but tomorrow I'll write a nice long confrontation chapter so be sure to tune in ^_~

Mint: sadist who loves to torture? Heh heh, as much as I hate to admit it (well not really) you've definitely got me pegged ^_~

Kayoko: I didn't know you weren't supposed to drink while injured…hmm, oh well, we'll just say it made the alcohol that much more potent for Sakura then. ^_^

Everybody: I look forward to your reactions to this chapter and for all you Kakashi fans, don't worry, there will be more with him in the next chapter or the one after (we'll see how it plays out). Hope you enjoy!

~~~

The Butterfly: Chapter 13

By: Tea Leaf / Banana Soap

~~~

He stared at the ceiling. Sunlight was filtering through the curtains over the windows in his room. She was still asleep. She was still curled against him.

He'd been awake for a long time now. He hadn't moved yet. 

He'd had that dream again. The dream that spread from fantasy to reverse memories. It always started off with just she and him. That was his favorite part of the dream. That was the part that was fantasy. 

In the dream they were always just so comfortable with each other, they knew each other. Real life had yet to put him into that comfortable groove with her. In real life he always felt unsure. He could never tell what she was thinking anymore and he had no right to ask her. 

Then the dream shifted to the hospital. He hadn't been able to bring himself to go visit her there in real life. In the dream he was sitting on the bed with her as Tsunade told her about the three shiruken wounds on her back. The wounds he had helped create. And that always brought him back to that memory…the one that always woke him up.

It was the only time he'd ever felt afraid of her. 

She'd jumped in between him and Orochimaru. She'd been protecting him again.

There had been butterflies. There had been an open cut on her cheek.

The butterfly had flown to it; the butterfly had gone into it.

An angry black and red pattern had spread out from the wound. The same crimson and black pattern of the butterfly's wings. The same crimson and black pattern that flared on Kakashi's skin every time she touched him.

She'd collapsed and bit her lip until she'd drawn blood, suffering some pain he didn't know of, and suddenly wings made of finely spun strings of red and blue chakra had grown from her back. 

Her eyes had been pure black as she'd opened them and risen to her feet. 

He'd been terrified; Sakura had morphed into some beautiful monstrosity before his very eyes. He'd felt the chakra emanating from her; it had not been unlike a demon's.

Then the butterfly had taken control of her body, he refused to believe that she herself would ever be capable of the violence with which Orochimaru had been attacked. She'd moved so quickly and suddenly that even that snake had not had the speed to react. She'd punched him right through the chest. 

But as if the wound hadn't been enough, the pattern on her skin had leaked onto Orochimaru. He still had nightmares from the agonized screams that had ensued as a result of the poison that had coated her. 

Tsunade had jumped in then and decapitated Orochimaru. But Sakura hadn't stopped. The creature in her mind seemed to think that Tsunade was now a threat as well. 

In the blink of an eye, three shirukens had been embedded into her back between her shoulder blades. Thrown by himself, Naruto and Kakashi. 

She'd been in the hospital for months. Tsunade had wanted to keep her longer and evaluate her for mental trauma. 

She'd left without anyone's permission. Kakashi had found her the next day huddled on the floor of her bedroom in her family's house. She hadn't known her parents were dead.

Kakashi had taken her in and things had moved on but there had been a new tension. Sakura had become afraid of physical contact with other people. And to be honest, other people had all become afraid of physical contact with her.

Thinking back, she'd probably been lying to them when she'd said she didn't like to be touched. She'd probably craved it. She'd said it so that people wouldn't feel bad for avoiding coming into physical contact with her.

At the jounin exams, everyone who had been chosen to face her in hand-to-hand combat had forfeited, himself included.

Even now he still felt like a coward for it. She'd earned his respect. He should have faced her. But…he just couldn't at the time.

It had been so stupid. Kakashi had explained to them what had happened time and time again. His logical mind had known she was still normal but his body just couldn't accept it. Not then at least. 

Now he could. Now a good portion of her bare skin was in contact with his, his hand was even resting over the scar her had give her. 

But he worried that now might be too late. He closed his eyes against the memory of her hysterics at the hospital in the Cloud country when she'd been screaming that her skin was poisonous.

He'd helped create that belief in her mind. He'd treated her like it was true when he'd known it wasn't. 

He'd helped cause this damage that ran so deep within her that it didn't have enough room inside of her and had risen to her skin, taking the form of the cobwebs of scar tissue on her arms. He suspected there were more all over her body but he had yet to see them and so his mind still fervently hoped that his suspicions were simply that, suspicions. 

His arm unconsciously squeezed her a little closer to him. She winced and tensed, a soft sound of pain escaping her lips. He relaxed his muscles again and her breathing returned to normal.

He was pretty sure she would wake easily which was why he still hadn't moved. She needed her sleep. He half hoped that he would fall asleep again and she would wake up and he could simply follow her lead in how to react.

He didn't know how to react. 

He'd been surprised to see and feel her there when he'd woken up, it had taken him a moment to think past his headache and remember the night before. She'd looked so vulnerable when she'd stopped at the door to the spare room. 

He almost suspected she'd been afraid which is why she'd asked to stay with him. He certainly wasn't about to let his ego convince him that it was because she had wanted to continue what had started at the kitchen table. 

Now that was a whole other can of worms. He decided to take the coward's way out and follow her lead over that as well. 

There was a pounding on the front door. He winced as it echoed around in his head. 

He decided to swear off tequila for a while. 

He didn't move and she didn't stir. He hoped the visitor would take the hint and go away.

The pounding came louder this time and he almost groaned in pain as the knock resounded in his skull again. 

She shifted slightly.

This simply would not do. The pounding was painful and was waking her up. It had to stop. 

The pounding continued. She stirred again. The visitor wasn't going to go away. He had to get up. 

He didn't want to. He'd come back after, hopefully she wouldn't even notice he was gone. He loosened her arm from around his chest and flattened the one she was lying on as best he could and slid out from the bed, again doing his best to avoid waking her.

Her outstretched hand clutched weakly at his as he slid away but as he kept moving it dropped back to the bed. She snuggled into the warm depression his body had left in the mattress. He smiled a little.

The pounding came again. He turned and scowled as he went softly down the stairs and wrenched open the door, receiving the fist that had been about to hit the wood in the face.

"Ah, sorry Sasuke!" Naruto exclaimed as Sasuke scowled evilly at him and raised a hand to his now bloody nose.

"What the hell do you want? And keep it down!" he snapped, his voice raspy from dehydration as a result of the previous night.

Naruto grinned. "A bit hung over there Sasuke?" he said loudly.

Sasuke kicked him hard in the shin.

"Oww! Fine. I'm not here to waste time with you anyway!" the blonde snapped.

"Then why are you here?" Sasuke ground out.

"I heard Sakura was back but she wasn't at her old apartment and she wasn't at any of the inns. I was wondering if you knew where she is." Naruto responded.

Sasuke pinched the bridge of his nose, partly to stem the blood flow, partly out of annoyance.

"Yes I do know where she is. She's upstairs. Asleep." Sasuke answered pointedly. 

"She is?" Naruto responded, his eyes lighting up with excitement as he pushed passed Sasuke before he could stop him and bounded up the stairs. Sasuke cursed and followed him.

Naruto froze at the top of the stairs. 

  
Sakura stood in the hallway dressed in an oversized white button down shirt. Her long hair was a little mussed and her eyes were still a little drowsy.

Naruto grinned.

"Sakura-chan!" he exclaimed loudly as he rushed her, ignoring how she winced at the noise, and grabbed her in a huge bear hug. 

She cried out sharply. 

Naruto all but dropped her immediately, fearful that he had hurt her.

"Sakura, are you all right?" Sasuke asked as he came towards her.

"I'm fine. Sorry Naruto, my ribs are just a bit sore." She reassured the blonde.

Naruto smiled again then frowned at her.

"What happened? You should have waited for me to come back before you left! You shouldn't have left by yourself! You shouldn't have left at all! Why haven't you answered yet? What happened to you? Why are your ribs sore? Why is you leg bandaged? Why are you staying at Sasuke's house? Why are you wearing his shirt?!" Naruto questioned her mercilessly, not stopping long enough in his barrage to give her the chance to answer.

She frowned at him as his voice made her head feel like a bunch of mini people were mining in her brain. She clapped her hand over his mouth.

"If you would stop to breath, I would answer you." She responded coldly.

She held his gaze for a moment and removed her hand. He remained quiet.

"Thank you. I'm sorry I couldn't wait for you. I am not sorry I went alone. I am not sorry I left. I got into a fight and walked away a little worse for ware. I had nowhere else to stay. And I didn't have any clothes to sleep in. Satisfied?" she answered as she cocked her eyebrow. 

Sasuke smirked from his spot behind Naruto.

Naruto pouted.

"No." he answered childishly.

"Tough." Sakura answered.

"Now, as great as it is to see you Naruto, I am still recovering from my injuries and my traveling and am very tired. Could I possibly take a rain check on this conversation?" she asked then, smiling a bit to coax him out of his pouty mood.

He mock considered for a moment.

"Fine!" he relented finally. "Come over for dinner tonight, Hinata's making ramen!" he suggested then with a grin.

Sakura's smile widened a bit, amused by Naruto's sudden switch from pouty to excited.

"Alright, I'll come over this evening and you can question me all you like." She consented. 

"Now, may I please go back to bed?" she asked, mock-pleadingly as she stifled a yawn. 

Naruto grin switched to a cute half smile.

"Yes you may." He answered. 

She half smiled back at him and went back into Sasuke's room. Naruto's eyes narrowed and he turned his gaze to Sasuke.

"Stay out of it." he stated before Naruto could open his mouth.

Naruto settled for a glare. "For now." He answered and went back down the stairs. Sasuke followed him.

"You should come to dinner too." Naruto said as he reached the door. "I'm sure you want to hear her answers too." 

Sasuke paused.

"Aa." He answered then and Naruto waved slightly as he took his leave.

Sasuke went into the kitchen and washed the blood from his hand and nose. He then found a pen and scribbled "GO AWAY!" largely on a piece of paper that he then taped to the front door before closing and locking it.

He turned away from the door and saw Sakura standing at the top of the staircase.

"I thought you were going back to bed." He stated.

"I intend to." She said as she continued to stare at him pointedly.

"What?" he asked finally.

"I'm waiting for you." She said, a little annoyed.

"Why?" he asked as he frowned in confusion.

"Look, last night was the first time I have been able to really sleep properly since Kakashi disappeared. So get back up here, if you're not tired, bring a book, and get back into bed with me." She ordered him. 

He blinked. That had to be the oddest command he had ever received.  

But then, he was still tired _{and if Sakura is demanding I get back into bed with her, well, who am I to deny her?} _his ego commented.

He shrugged and walked up the stairs and flopped back into bed. She removed his borrowed shirt and did the same, immediately curling against him again.

_{Oh yes, I could definitely get used to this…}_ his ego commented smugly. He couldn't help it and he smirked in response. He was suddenly glad for his decision to follow her lead in this. 

But she didn't notice, she'd fallen asleep again and soon he did the same.


	14. Everything to Everyone

Disclaimer: Naruto and its characters are still not mine.

A/N: Wow, thank you everyone for your amazing response to the last chapter! It totally made my day. The reviews have just been so phenomenal, I'm glad you all liked it so much. 

And Mint, you're right, I am planning something. 

About the pairings: Again the question has come up and gain I shall tell you, I'm not sure. At the moment I'm having a lot of fun playing with all the possibilities so you'll just have to wait and see and see whichever pairing you like for the moment. 

In some related news, the drawing I did of Sakura with the butterfly wings ( found here for those who haven't seen it mediaminer. org /fanart /view .php /162165 ) received a request to be used in the banners and logos of a (I think) small original fiction site. When I have the address, I'll send it along because it looks like this fic might possibly become hosted in the Anime fanfiction part of the site as well. 

Also, the first chapter of the story has been put up on Rokudaime as well as tons of other new stories so you should go check them out. 

This chapter isn't very eventful but I promise the next one will have the first of many confrontations between Sakura and Sasuke so stay tuned. I hope to have it up late tonight. 

~~~

The Butterfly: Chapter 14

By: Tea Leaf / Banana Soap

~~~

She felt good. Her body was pleasantly heavy as it always is after you wake up from blissful sleep. She was so warm. She felt rested. She felt normal for the first time in years. Her eyes opened a bit and she watched the steady rise and fall of his chest.

They were both lying on their sides, facing each other and cuddling close. 

She'd missed waking up with another body. She'd missed sleeping with another body. Who was she kidding? She's missed sleeping plain and simple. 

She felt a little guilty though. She was a little worried that Sasuke would get the wrong idea. It wasn't _his_ presence that she needed, it was simply _a_ presence and he just happened to be the one on hand.

She couldn't tell him that though, at least not now at any rate. He'd be offended and wouldn't let her sleep with him anymore and then she wouldn't be able to sleep at all again. 

She sighed softly. She'd ask Gaara what he thought she should do, he was good at figuring out sticky situations. 

Thinking of Gaara, she had promised to go visit him today. She lifted herself a bit to peer over Sasuke's body and see the digital clock on the other side.

Noon already! Damn, she had so much to do today and so much less time in which to do it now.

She easily slipped out of Sasuke's grasp. He was still sound asleep. She wasn't surprised, he didn't sleep much on the train and she was willing to bet that he hadn't slept much while he'd been pursuing her either. 

She stood up out of the bed. First step, she needed a shower. She headed to the bathroom. 

~~~

Sasuke flopped over onto his stomach. That wasn't right, there should have been something stopping him from doing that. 

His eyes opened groggily as he looked around the bed and saw that he was now the sole occupant of it.

He frowned. _{Where did she--}_ then he heard the sound of rushing water coming from the shower in his bathroom. 

His ego toyed with the idea of joining her. His conscience sucker punched his ego and told him not to. 

So he flopped over onto his back and waited. 

He didn't wait long, the shower was turned off a few minutes later and he heard a bit of shuffling and he assumed she was dying herself off.

She came out with a towel wrapped around her body. 

"Oh, you woke up." She said simply as she spotted him watching her.

"I did." he answered easily.

She walked over to the small pile of clothes she'd been wearing for the past few days and pulled on the shorts under the towel. She turned her back to him and dropped the towel.

He was glad for her long strands of wet hair that hid here back. He didn't want to see those scars right now. 

She pulled on the mesh shirt and then the red dress before pulling her long hair out from between her back and her shirt and twisted in into a messy bun.

"Do you have a pen?" she asked.

He blinked. She turned to look at him.

He pointed to the dresser. She walked over and spotted one and jammed it through her hair, holding the knot in place.

"Where are you going?" he asked then as his mind finally clued in that she was in a hurry and getting dressed so she could go out. 

"I promised to go see Gaara today and I promised Tsunade to go by the hospital and I need to go clothes shopping and then I promised Naruto I'd go over to his place for dinner…" She answered as she straightened her red dress. 

It needed to be washed, desperately, but it would do for now. 

"I could come with you…" he offered then.

She looked at him and blinked in surprise.

"No, its fine, you stay in and sleep." She answered, smiling a bit.

"I'll see you later" she called as she left the room and the house. 

He opened his mouth to ask why her wounds weren't bound but she'd been gone before he could. 

~~~

Sakura limped as fast as she could to the guesthouses were visiting shinobi always stayed and she knew Gaara would be staying.

She was cursing herself for not replacing the splints for her leg but she'd been in a hurry and she was going by the hospital later so she could do it then. 

Gaara was sitting outside; Mika was playing with the sand from the gourd on his back. 

He looked up and smiled at her as she approached, Mika waved happily. 

She smiled back at Gaara and ruffled Mika's hair a bit before taking a grateful seat beside her friend on the bench he was occupying. She hadn't realized her leg was this weak without its supports. 

"Good afternoon. You look rested." He said as he reached up and grasped her chin lightly, moving her head around to look at her face from different angles.

"Well I am rested, that's why I'm here so late." She responded easily.

"I'm glad to hear that." He told her seriously, his green eyes holding hers.

"Why aren't your wounds bandaged?" he asked her then, noticing her chest didn't look nearly as constraint as usual and her right leg and forearms were bare.

"I was in a hurry and didn't have time to rebind everything after I showered. But, the wounds are a month old now so they should be able to hold up until I visit the hospital later." She answered.

Gaara frowned slightly but let it go. She didn't need to hear a "take better care of yourself" speech from him and she did intend to stop by the hospital to get her wounds examined so at least she was conscious of the possible harms.

"Why were you in a rush?" he asked instead.

"I have lots to do today. Had to come see you, have to get new clothes (these ones are really starting to smell)" she said as she wrinkled her nose a bit, Gaara gave her a half smile. "Then I told Tsunade I'd stop by the hospital and I promised Naruto I'd go over for ramen with him and Hinata. Not a lot if I had started in the morning but I only woke up at noon." She said before stifling a yawn that crept up on her. 

Gaara nodded and stood up.

She looked at him quizzically.

"We can talk and shop at the same time." He said. Sakura smiled. 

Mika cheered, she loved shopping. 

So they headed over to the market.

"So tell me of your travels." Gaara said as they walked at a comfortable pace.

"I'm afraid I can't really say much about it. The first few days I was just walking through the woods and then decided to stay at an inn because of the rain. I met some gypsies there and thought it would be pretty interesting to travel with them instead of by myself. A mistake. Got drugged, and well, I'm sure Mika's told you about that part." She said in an undertone. She didn't want to discuss the tribe in front of the little girl.

Gaara nodded.

"The rest is essentially a blur. I remember starting to move again and waking up in a hospital. I remember leaving and wandering some more, then winding up in another hospital near the border with the Cloud Country. Then I found out that Kakashi-sensei was in a coma in the northern part of the country so I went there. Found him but something happened. And Sasuke was there…and then I woke up again and was told I'd been in a coma for 6 days. Then we took the train back here and here I am." She concluded as they reached the shopping district and started to browse the shops.

"Why is that part so blurry to you?" Gaara asked as he kept his eyes on Mika as the little girl examined a sequined dress.

"Shiny!" she said to herself as she played with the material.

"I had a bad head injury and was fighting off the side effects of the drug at first and then I got a really bad infection and spent the whole trip slipping in and out of consciousness and battling the illness." She answered honestly as she examined a rack of black shirts.

Gaara frowned and went to pick Mika up off the floor before a shopper trampled her.

Sakura sighed as she grabbed a bunch of things off the rack. He was not impressed with her and now she wouldn't be able to ask him about Sasuke. 

~~~

Sakura made her way into the hospital with various bags and packages. Gaara had not questioned her any further on her expedition; he hadn't really spoken much at all for the rest of the shopping spree. But Mika had talked enough to fill in the silence. 

Tsunade was waiting for her in the lobby.

"Are you moving in?" she asked sarcastically at the site of all the bags.

She rolled her eyes.

"Why aren't your wounds bound?" she asked then, her eyes narrowing a bit.

"I didn't have time earlier but I figured seeing as I was coming here anyway, you could take and look and re-dress them" she answered as she set her bags down with the receptionist.

Tsunade "hmph"ed. 

"This way." She said as she turned and walked down the hall. Sakura followed, pushing a stray strand of pink hair behind her ear. 

She walked into a bare room. Kakashi lay on the bed. Sakura felt sad suddenly, there were no flowers or visitors or even guards to keep him company.

"I need you to touch him." Tsunade said bluntly.

"Why? We've told you what happens." Sakura responded as she stayed at the door.

"I need to see it for myself, please comply Sakura." The Hokage answered.

Sakura swallowed and stepped into the room, walking up to the bed. Her hand trembled as she reached out and stroked his cheek. Again the pattern flared, this time she almost thought he winced at the contact.

She pulled her hand away, lifting it to her lips as her eyes glazed over slightly.

_{The one person who's never been afraid to touch me is now the one who suffers from it the most…}_ her inner self spoke in a dead tone.

Tsunade's eyes were wide. She hadn't wanted to believe it. She hadn't wanted to believe that Sakura had poisoned Kakashi. 

What amazed though was that poison was highly corrosive. If Kakashi had been in contact with it, he should be dead. But he wasn't.

The 5th Hokage frowned and made notes on her clipboard.

"Alright Sakura, lets take a look at you now." Tsunade said before leading her into another room and having her sit on the examination table.

"Would you mind removing your clothes please?" Tsunade asked monotonously as she pulled out and examined a chart. Sakura did as requested.

Tsunade came over and started poking and prodding at her leg.

"How long ago was it broken?" she asked.

"About a month" the girl responded.

"You're lucky, your bones heal quickly. I want you to keep walking without the splints to help rebuild the muscle but if you're going to do any running and training, both of which I highly discourage at the moment" Tsunade looked at her sternly " wear the splints." 

"Lift your arms please" she said then and Sakura again complied and Tsunade started poking at her ribs. She winced slightly.

"The bone is healing well but you'll have a lump because it didn't set quite right." Tsunade began.

Sakura wasn't surprised at that, her makeshift job didn't have to be perfect, just functional. 

"The bindings you wear are too tight though, they're preventing proper blood flow to the area and slowing down the healing, you're also developing bruises and skin irritation. So, no more bindings. If you're that worried about your breasts, wear a bra." She continued bluntly. 

"Stand up please." She asked then, and Sakura complied.

"You're too thin." She muttered and then scribbled down something on a prescription pad.

"I want you to take one of these pills at every meal, it'll help you regain the weight. Its not healthy to be as thin as you are. Drink lots of milk too, it will help your bones recover."

Sakura nodded.

Tsunade pulled the pen out from her hair and prodded around the back of her skull.

"Your head wound has healed nicely" she commented. 

She examined her arm then, specifically the latest kunai wound. The stitches had been removed while she was still up north but the infection had left a nasty scar around the cut. The wound itself was healing well and was starting to scab.

"Alright, you'll do." Tsunade said finally and Sakura pulled her clothing back on.

"If any of your wounds start to irritate you again, I want you to come to me immediately. And remember to keep taking your antibiotics and start taking these pills as well" she said as she handed her the prescription slip. 

Sakura nodded and rewound her hair, sticking the pen back in. 

"Is that everything?" she asked.

"For today yes. But come back tomorrow and ask Gaara to bring Mika around too. I would like to do some blood tests." Tsunade replied. 

Sakura nodded and left the room. 

Tsunade smiled slightly to herself. Sakura's health was improving, she was healing quickly and Tsunade suspected that she had been sleeping more too. Having Uchiha baby-sit her seemed to be helping.

But then she frowned as she remembered Kakashi's situation and walked back to the comatose jounin's room. __

~~~

Sakura collected her things and the bottle of pills from the reception desk and walked slowly back to Sasuke's house. The door was unlocked and she smiled at the sign that was still there. 

She went up the stairs into the spare room and dropped her bags on the bed and then started hunting for something to wear.

She had figured that Tsunade would tell her not to bind her ribs anymore, she'd already decided to stop for a while beforehand. She picked up a plain black bag and dumped its contents on the bed. 

Good thing she had stopped at that lingerie store. At first she'd done it mainly to embarrass Gaara and get him to loosen out of his funk a bit. He'd taken one look at the store and had decided to take Mika to the toy store instead of going in with her, even after she'd jokingly offered to model for him. 

She picked up a black lace bra and the matching panties and set them aside. She then grabbed another bag and dumped it, hunting for the black sleeveless shirt with the red Chinese knots she'd gotten. She set that aside too as well as a pair of black mid-calf length pants. 

She then stripped off her clothes and tossed them in the trash, she never wanted to wear them again, and put on her new things.

It felt so good to be in fresh, dry, clean clothes for the first time in a month. 

She then pulled the pen out of her hair and grabbed the brush and pins she'd bought and tamed the mass into a real bun. 

_{Much better}_ her inner self approved. 

She then grabbed come red gauze and bound her forearms. She didn't care about the scars but she knew Naruto would. 

She left the room and walked into Sasuke's, half expecting him to have gone back to sleep but the bed was perfectly made and the only trace that he'd been here were the pajama pants hanging over the edge of his laundry hamper.

She frowned slightly, wondering where he was then shrugged it off. 

She had to get to Naruto's. 

As she turned to leave she cast one last look at the bed and noticed a key ring lounging in the middle of it. 

She smiled a bit; he'd left her the spare key.

She grabbed it and left the house, locking the door behind her before heading over to the apartment complexes. 

~~~

Naruto was rushing around, reorganizing everything in the apartment. He was nervous.

Hinata frowned. She didn't really understand why he was nervous; it was just Sakura and Sasuke coming over for ramen, not the Hokage. On second thought, the Hokage visiting probably wasn't the best comparison…

"Naruto, please calm down. You're making me dizzy." She said finally, a little exasperated. 

"Huh? Oh sorry Hinata" Naruto said as he grinned and rubbed the back of his head. 

Hinata smiled at him. He was just too cute sometimes.

There was a knock at the door.

Naruto ran to it and opened it in time to receive the knocker's fist in the face.

"Payback for this morning." Came a sarcastic deep voice. 

Naruto glared at Sasuke as his hand came up to stem the blood flow.

"That was an accident." Naruto responded in annoyance, referring to the incident of the morning.

"So was that" Sasuke responded as he stepped into the apartment.

"Hey Hinata." He said with a half smile.

"Hello Sasuke." Hinata said as she wiped away her sweat drop from the scene at the door. 

Naruto grumbled as he walked to the sink and washed the blood from his hand, his nose had already stopped bleeding. He'd always been a quick healer.

"Sakura's not here yet?" the dark haired young man asked with a slight frown as he scanned the room.

"Obviously not." Naruto answered sarcastically. 

Sasuke rolled his eyes.

A soft nock sounded at the door.

Naruto rushed to it again and answered.

Sakura smiled slightly at him.

"Sakura! Come in, come in" he said as he moved out of the way and waved her in. She laughed a little as she crossed the threshold.

"Ah, so this is where you were." She said to Sasuke as she saw him. He raised his eyebrow.

"Hi Hinata." She said then, turning to the Hyuuga heir. Hinata smiled at her. 

"How are you feeling Sakura-san?" she asked.

"I'm ok, I saw Tsunade-sama earlier and she said I was healing well, she even gave me the ok to walking without a splint for my leg." The pink haired girl answered as she walked over to the kitchen where Hinata was working.

"Anything I can do to help?" she offered.

"Oh, no thanks. I've got everything under control here." Hinata said as she chopped some vegetables.

"You can have a seat on the couch if you like." She continued.

Sakura nodded and sat down on one of the couches, Sasuke was sitting on the one opposite her. 

There was a table in between that had been set for four. 

Naruto came over and plopped down beside Sasuke across from Sakura, taking advantage of the moment to give his rival a charlie horse in the thigh as payback for the punch he'd taken to the face. Sasuke winced and gritted his teeth and dealt the hit back to the blonde.

Sakura sweat dropped.

_{I guess some things will never change}_ her inner self commented.

Hinata came out of the kitchen then carrying a tray with four large bowls of ramen on it and set them out before taking her seat next to Sakura.

"Itadakimasu" Naruto said brightly as he grabbed his chopsticks and started eating.

Sakura and Hinata chuckled slightly.

The meal passed essentially peacefully, the food had been great. But then, Sakura had always suspected that Hinata was a good cook. 

The dishes had been cleared and they were all lounging around on the couches, Sakura, Sasuke and Hinata were all holding and sipping at glasses of red wine. 

Naruto didn't like anything alcoholic so he had a large glass of milk.

For the past little while, Sakura had been relaying in as best detail she could every moment she had spent away from the village. Naruto was merciless in his questioning, asking about the most unusual things such as the favored ramen flavoring in the Cloud country. 

But now they were talking about Kakashi.

"What do you think is wrong with him?" Naruto asked. He had visited his former sensei earlier that morning and had thought he was asleep. The nurses had kicked him out for being too loud and obnoxious when he had tried to wake him up. 

"I don't know." She answered softly. "But he reacts to my skin so it must have something to do with me." 

"What did you do to him?" Naruto asked.

"I didn't do anything. At least I don't think I did, I hope I didn't." she answered again before taking another sip of her wine.

Sasuke was watching her very intently. It was a little offsetting. 

"How do you think the old hag's gonna fix him?" Naruto continued to question. 

"I don't know. She wants to run some blood tests tomorrow though." She answered.

Sasuke frowned.

"Blood tests?" Naruto asked as he frowned as well.

She shrugged.

"The old hag thinks it has something to do with blood?" Naruto continued to pry.

"Naruto, I don't know." She said, enunciating carefully to make sure he understood her.

Naruto sighed and his face drooped a bit.

Hinata moved and sat on the arm of the other couch, wrapping her arm around Naruto's broad shoulders. 

"I'm sure Tsunade-sama will figure it out." Hinata said softly.

Sakura and Sasuke suddenly felt like they were intruding.

"We should get going." He said then as he stood up.

Sakura nodded and stood as well.

Hinata and Naruto followed them with their eyes.

"Thanks for dinner you guys, it was nice. You're an awesome cook Hinata" Sakura said with her polite smile as she and Sasuke moved to the door.

They waved slightly as they left, closing the door behind them. 

They didn't speak to each other as they walked back to Sasuke's house. He kept his pace slow so that she could easily keep up.


	15. Beware the Answers to your Questions

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.

A/N: Well…I'm not really sure how I feel about this chapter (suiting because none of the characters in it seem to know how they feel either but that's beside the point) It feels a bit awkward and a bit rushed to me…maybe I was just distracted while writing. I dunno…

Anyways, thank you again to everyone who has been reading and reviewing me, I really appreciate it. Please keep it up, I really would love some feedback on this one.

Oh a weird coincidence maybe but while I was writing, a reviewer suggested I do exactly what I was doing…it was a little odd…hmm *shrug*

~~~

The Butterfly: Chapter 15

By: Tea Leaf

~~~

He considered removing the sign on the door as they entered but decided against it. With any luck, people might take the hint this way. 

He stepped into the dark hallway and she followed him in, making her way towards the stairs. 

He went into the kitchen. 

He stared at the contents of the fridge. He was stalling. He closed the door and looked up, she was leaning against the doorjamb. Wearing a black spaghetti strapped scrap of cloth that barely reached her thighs. He blinked at her.

She lifted an eyebrow.

He went over to the table, intending to sit down. Couldn't. But she was blocking the door and preventing him from leaving. 

He stood in front of the window.

She frowned at his back.

"What's wrong?" she asked him.

He frowned at the window. It wasn't that something was wrong, it was…he sighed.

"I think we need to talk." He said eventually.

She closed her eyes briefly.

_{Damn…}_

She sat down at the table.

"So talk" she said.

"I don't know what to say." He answered honestly. 

She nodded.

"About last night?" she questioned.

He didn't respond. 

She took that as a yes. And bit her lip as she tried to collect her words.

"Look…about the sleeping thing…I just…I can't sleep by myself. And I'm sorry if I gave you any kind of misconceptions but I really needed sleep…" she said awkwardly.

He turned to look at her.

"How do you know that you need someone else there to be able to sleep?" he asked her. He didn't look angry or offended but she got the feeling that her answer would be important to him.

"Because the last time I was able to sleep properly there was someone else there and I haven't been able to sleep properly on every night I've been alone." She answered as she frowned in confusion.

What was he getting at?

"How did you start sleeping with other people?" he asked, still watching her, still calm and still she felt uneasy.

"I used to get really bad nightmares…" she started, she didn't want to talk about this with him, he wouldn't understand.

He sat down across from her, still watching her intently.

"Why does it matter?" she asked then, starting to get frustrated.

He held her gaze for a long moment then looked away.

"It doesn't really, I suppose." He responded evenly.

She debated on pursuing the matter, she decided she really didn't want to know why he was lying to her. She'd allow him his secrets as long as he allowed her hers.

"Why do you need another person?" he asked quietly, still not looking at her.

She looked away as well. 

"I don't like being alone." She answered softly.

"Why not, what's wrong with being alone?" he asked her then as he turned to look at her again.

"Why are you asking me these questions?" she asked back as she met his eyes.

He frowned slightly, and his eyes dropped.

"I'm just…I don't know you anymore." He said finally.

She raised a hand to rub her temples as empathy stole into her. She sighed and looked out the window.

"I'm…I'm just not the type of person who copes well with being alone. It makes me feel isolated…and I just…I don't like it." She answered awkwardly.

He nodded and the silence stretched again.

"I'm sorry I never visited you in the hospital back then." He said eventually.

She frowned at the comment and looked at him questioningly. He didn't look at her.

"I forgive you." She answered.

He stood then and she did as well and they left the room.

"What are you wearing?" he asked eventually, a perplexed half smile on his lips. 

"Its called a nightie." She answered with a tinge of sarcasm. "It's the next best thing to sleeping naked." 

"You sleep naked?" he asked as he raised an eyebrow at her.

"Normally but I didn't think you would really go for that." She said innocently as she walked ahead of him to the bedroom.

~~~

Sakura sat stiffly on the examination table. She'd hated needles ever since she had seen the damage they had done to Sasuke all those years ago after the battle with Haku.

True, those had been acupuncture needles, but still. A needle was a needle. And now there was one jammed into the vein in her left elbow and sucking out her blood. 

But what really churned her stomach about the affair was that poor little Mika was in the room next door suffering the same fate. 

So she gritted her teeth as the bag filled. Though she still wasn't sure what Tsunade intended to do to her blood.

~~~

Tsunade frowned over the report Shikamaru and Ino had written for her. 

According to their research, the butterfly poison didn't affect Sakura because of some anomaly in her blood. It was an anomaly that the butterflies responded to on a primitive level, which was why they were so protective and possessive of her. 

Now Tsunade had two other cases where the poison had not proven fatal. 

In the case of Mika, the gypsy tribe survivor, it was unclear whether or not she was immune to the butterfly poison and Tsunade had no intention of testing it. So she assumed that the little girl had. If she had, logically that meant she had the same anomaly Sakura had.

Then there was Kakashi who had obviously come into contact with the poison; it was found in a heavily diluted form all over his skin. So when you touched him, your skin didn't burn but it definitely felt warm. But then he was in this catatonic state. 

Theoretically she would find a prominent anomaly in the samples provided by Sakura and Mika and find traces of a similar anomaly in the blood sample she had taken from Kakashi. 

If it worked out that way, she hoped to derive a cure for the poison from Sakura's blood

What she couldn't explain though was the pattern that flared on Kakashi's skin every time Sakura touched him. She had experimented with Mika, having the little girl touch his hand, but nothing had happened. It either meant that Mika didn't have the anomaly or there was something specific about Sakura or she and Kakashi's past interaction that triggered it.

~~~

She felt light headed. But losing a liter of blood did tend to do that to people. 

Gaara had offered to stay with her but she had wanted to visit with her old sensei for a bit. So Gaara and the sleeping Mika (she had been knocked out when she had started to freak out over the needle) had left, leaving her alone with him. 

She sighed as she looked at him. She supposed most people thought he looked like he was asleep. His facial muscles were slack; his expression was calm. 

She knew for a fact that he did not look like that when he was asleep. He always smiled in his sleep. His skin always flushed slightly.  

She thought he looked like a corpse and that frightened her. She didn't want to believe that this cold, pale, expressionless body could be that same person she had known. The man she'd known had always had some secret passion driving his every movement. 

She'd loved that about him, he'd always had enough passion to drive her movements as well.

She'd fallen into a funk after he'd disappeared. It had been like her emotions had been completely drained out of her, leaving her hollow. 

All she could do was sit at the bridge and wait. 

She must have been so pathetic; she had certainly felt pathetic. But she simply hadn't had the ability to do anything more. She'd never been any good at moving with her own momentum. 

It had taken her until last month before she had been able to move on. And wasn't it perfect? She'd finally tried to move on from everything and everything had just come right back to the surface, holding her back once again.

She'd never thought that she would ever believe that Sasuke and Kakashi were holding her back from anything. 

But what was she thinking? What were they holding her back from? Nothing, that's what. There simply was nothing else for her. 

She pulled her knees up to her chin, resting her feet on her chair as her cheek rested on her knees.

She'd been happy with Kakashi. They'd had a good life. She'd almost been able to forget…she was sure she could have forgotten had he stayed with her.

But he had left and had left her behind. Just like Sasuke. Just like Naruto. Just like Ino. She was always left behind, trailing in the dust.

  That's what she liked about Gaara. He was never in a hurry. He didn't really have anywhere to go either. He intentionally walked behind and he would always slow his pace so that she could keep up. 

But now Kakashi had come to a standstill as well but this one hadn't been of his freed will.

"I'm stuck here" 

It was her fault he was stuck here. It was her job to fix it. But how? 

She continued to watch his calm face. He continued to stay still.

~~~

He was distracted. Very distracted. So distracted that Neji was going easy on him and he was still getting hit. 

Finally Neji simply stopped all together.

"You're making for a very lousy sparring partner today." The Hyuuga member said emotionlessly. 

"I know." He muttered dejectedly as he rubbed a pressure point Neji had hit in his chest.

Neji sighed in annoyance.

"To be continued then." He responded as he left.

Sasuke collapsed unto the long grass and stared up at the sky.

A small white butterfly landed on his nose. He stared cross-eyed at it. 

This was the type of butterfly Sakura should be. 

Small, perfect, innocent, pure, beautiful. That was how he'd always seen her.

_{hmph, how could you have seen her when you never looked at her?}_ his conscience commented snidely.

He glared at the thought and the butterfly took off, flying away from him. 

_{And there goes your ideal}_

He continued to glare and ignored the voice.

{Admit it, you're preoccupied with that ideal. I kept telling you to look at her. I kept telling you to see the real her. There's a reason I'm your conscience, its because I'm right. That's why  you're supposed to listen to me}

He sighed. 

"Stupid conscience…" he muttered.

But it was right. 

He growled in frustration at himself. He was just so damn confused. He felt like he'd been left out of the loop of something important. 

He didn't understand her. He didn't understand why it was important to him that he understand her. 

He didn't know…he just didn't know…

He had to ask her. 

~~~

Sakura sat on the couch in the living room, watching the sunset through the window. She was feeling numb again. She didn't like feeling numb.

She heard the door open and a few moments later Sasuke sat down on the couch beside her. 

"How did you become accustomed to sleeping with other people?" he asked bluntly. 

She sighed and closed her eyes. She didn't want to talk about this, not with him. 

"Why does it matter?" she asked.

"I don't know, it just does." He answered her.

Her eyes snapped open and narrowed at him.

"I used to get really bad nightmares. When I was with someone else, I didn't get them. So I simply stayed with someone else all the time." She answered in an annoyed tone.

"Who?" he asked her then.

"None of your business." She snapped.

"Sakura, please tell me." He said softly as he looked at her.

"Don't do this." She answered as she looked away from him.

"Don't do what?" he asked frowning slightly.

"Ask questions to which you don't want to hear the answer." She answered softly.

"I do want the answers." 

She sighed. 

"Kakashi…the nightmares started after that fight…and Kakashi would comfort me…he kept me safe from them." She answered as she pulled her knees up to her chin and wrapped her arms around them.

"Yesterday you said you normally slept naked." He said then, his eyes narrowing.

"I do." She said as she closed her eyes and leaned her forehead into her knees.

"Why?" he asked brutally.

"Kakashi-sensei…Kakashi didn't like it when I would cut myself so I promised to stop…but then…then…and I…I just couldn't take it…I needed…I needed something to make me feel human…he was the only one who wasn't afraid to touch me…" she whispered brokenly as her hair fell and hid her face.

Sasuke sat back and clenched his teeth together. She was right; he hadn't wanted to know that. He stood up and calmly walked away from her. He went up the stairs and into his room and closed the door softly behind him. He got into bed and stared at the ceiling. His mind seemed to have gone numb…he simply couldn't process what she had and what she hadn't told him. 

He heard the front door open and close. He remained and stared at the ceiling.    

~~~

M/A/N (more author notes): Well, a good number of reviewers have suggested to me to get beta readers to keep track of conventions, etc. I really don't know. I have nothing against beta readers, I think they're great and really useful but as you all know, I write rather quickly and so getting beta readers for this particular story would slow down the updates but would improve the quality. And so I'm tossing it out there, if you think I should get beta readers for this story, let me know. If you would like to be one of the beta readers (which would commit you to about 2 chapters a day) once again, please let me know. 

Alright, that's all for now. Please let me know how you feel about this chapter because I feel that there's something off about it but I just don't know what or how to fix it (I suppose now would be one of those moments where I really need a beta reader, eh?) So please review and I'll see you guys tomorrow. 


	16. Hypothermia

Disclaimer: Naruto's not mine so all standard disclaimers apply.

A/N: This chapter should help clear up Sakura and Kakashi's relationship a bit…maybe…I dunno. I've still got a lot planned in regards to them. Thank you very much to everyone who reviewed the last chapter, I feel better about it now. And a special thanks to Fly for helping me sort out the beta situation. I think a beta reader just isn't appropriate for this fic if only because I write so much and so I'm not sure a beta would be able to keep up and tons have people have been telling me how much they love the regular updates and a beta would again slow that down. So maybe in future fics, but in this one I'll just keep proof reading it myself. I'm sorry if I miss a few mistakes or if it feels off. And Kayoko, I'm going to try and explain Sasuke's reactions better in the next chapter so you can tell me if I did a good job on that. Ivy, don't worry ^_~ there's tons more to come in the story and there will be enough with everyone to favor any pairing you like. 

So, here's the next chapter, I hope you guys enjoy it and I look forward to your reviews ^_^

~~~

The Butterfly: Chapter 16

By: Tea Leaf / Banana Soap

~~~

She felt numb. It was growing. She couldn't feel the subtle pain from her leg anymore and was walking normally. The world was slowly becoming consumed in that shadowed tunnel vision that had plagued her for the past two years. 

She'd told him he didn't want to know. He didn't see her as human either. 

Kakashi had recognized her humanity, he was the only one who had ever understood and fully accepted her. 

She was walking through the woods. She didn't need to think about the direction, her feet knew it instinctively, they always had. 

She stood at the edges.

Hundreds of black and crimson butterflies were resting in the moonlight. They were so still, almost looking like flowers on the long strands of grass. 

She sat down. They didn't move; they were accustomed to her visiting them in the middle of the night. 

She pulled out her kunai and stared at it for a long time. The moonlight gleamed off its sharp edge. 

The numbness was consuming her. 

But she couldn't…she'd promised him she wouldn't…he was back and she had to honor that promise now. 

She stabbed the kunai into the ground and stared at the butterflies for a long time.

A small blue and black one perched on her leg. She stroked its wings. 

She sighed. 

This was the moment where he used to walk up behind her. 

He never said much; he would just sit beside her and keep her company. He'd always tried to look out for her; it had started long before she had gone to live with him. And it had never really changed.

Even while she'd been unconscious he had still helped her.

She frowned at the thought. She was sure that her subconscious mind hadn't invented that Kakashi. He really had spoken to her. But how?

Come to think of it, every time she had lost consciousness, he'd been there in the form of some pleasant memory to keep her company and remind her that it was worth it to wake up again. 

She picked up the butterfly from her leg and flicked her finger a bit, forcing it to flutter off her hand. 

She stood up and walked away from the woods, away from the kunai, away from the butterflies.  

~~~

She stopped at the doorway. The room still felt so empty, like a tomb. She stepped in and closed the door behind her. She walked over to the bed.

She brushed a stray strand of hair off his face, careful not to make contact with his skin. 

She sat down on the bed at looked at him for a long time. He was the only one who'd really ever understood. And although she knew that he wasn't the only one who cared, he was the only one who cared for the real her and not some made up ideal.

He'd known she wasn't the person everyone else had decided she was. She wasn't some china doll that needed to be protected. She wasn't perfect.

She was human and came with all the same insecurities and faults as everyone else. He'd been the only one to really know that though.

She wanted to touch him but she didn't dare. 

She gently took hold of his arm, using the bottom of her shirt as a barrier and moved it over a bit. She then lay down at his side, laying her head and hand on his chest, reassuring herself of his breathing. All the while making sure her skin never touched his.

She hated the irony of it. He, the only one who had ever understood her need for skin-to-skin contact was now the only one she could not have that with. 

She didn't sleep. She couldn't really. Not when Kakashi was a corpse because of her.

Her eyes glazed over and she slipped into that familiar zone between being awake and being asleep.

~~~

He couldn't sleep. He was worried about her. But he didn't move. The door didn't open again. Not once throughout the night. She didn't come back. 

He felt stupid. He shouldn't have asked her. She had told him twice not to ask her. She had told him he wouldn't like the answers. He hadn't listened. 

She hadn't even told him the full answers though. He had enough to guess at the situation but nothing about the circumstances. Or at least, not enough. 

He understood isolation, he understood needing to reassure your existence. He understood her side of things. 

He didn't understand how it had come about. He didn't understand what had happened with Kakashi at all. What had been his motivations if any?

What had really happened? She had only really said that she liked physical contact. He liked to believe that it was fully possible that she had slept with Kakashi as she had slept with him only they had been flesh to flesh. 

_{I wish…}_ his ego pouted.

He sneered at it, now wasn't about him.

But maybe it was. How did he fit into everything?

He needed to find her and apologize…

He didn't move.

~~~

She was shaking as she slowly rocked herself back and forth. She fumbled with her kunai in one hand. 

She wanted to, oh how she wanted to but she'd promised. 

She sat on the floor in her room in his apartment. The window was open, letting in the cold air. The room was spotless. She hadn't even been able to vent through destruction.

She'd tried training in the rain outside, and was now badly scrapped and bruised as a result. But she couldn't feel it. It wasn't enough.

She didn't feel anything. She needed to feel something. 

"Sakura-chan?" a voice called from down the hall. She didn't answer. She didn't want to hear her voice; it was numb. 

"Sakura?" the voice was at the door to her room now; her back was to the door. Her body kept moving. The kunai was slipping and dancing psychotically over her knuckles, she couldn't grasp it.

He quickly crouched down beside her and snatched it from her hand, tossing it aside, then grabbed her wrists, examining her arms carefully, looking for anything resembling a fresh slice wound.

"I didn't do it." she said in that hated dead voice, her torso still rocking slightly despite the fact that he was holding onto her arms.

"I promised you I wouldn't. But you're checking anyway." She said, still numb, still dead, still rocking. 

He looked up from her arms. She was soaking wet and shivering violently. Her arms were ice cold. 

He moved a hand to her forehead. She was cold.

Her lips were blue.

She was slipping into hypothermia. 

"shit" he muttered under his breath and picked her up off the floor and setting her on the bed.

He started pulling off her wet clothes.

"What are you doing?" she asked, narrowing her eyes.

"Sakura, you're sick. You need to take these wet clothes off." He told her. 

She glared slightly but did as requested and he closed the window before helping her under the covers of her bed. 

He stripped off his shirt and joined her, pulling her towards him and crushing her against his chest with one arm and the other rearranged the blankets in a cocoon around them to trap the heat.

Her eyes were wide.

"Now what are you doing?" she asked his neck seeing as she couldn't move.

"You're showing early signs of hypothermia. The quickest way to treat it is with body heat. You should know that from survival training." He responded as he kept her shivering body glued to him.

She didn't answer and hesitantly wrapped her arms around his waist.

~~~

She sighed at the memory. She was such a stupid girl, she was always getting sick. She always needed someone else to take care of her.

That had been the first time she had ever been flesh to flesh with anyone. That had been when she had started to learn that she could find her humanity through human contact and for as long as Kakashi had been around, she'd been fine. 

His body had been so warm then, like a furnace against her frozen, numb skin.

She hadn't felt numb when he'd held her. 

He was cold now. He barely gave off any body heat at all. Her inner self hoped that maybe she could be the one to warm him for once.

Tsunade walked in then and almost dropped the clipboard she was carrying.

The first shock was Sakura lying there. The second was Kakashi's hand resting on her hair at the top of her head. 

Sakura looked at her with empty green eyes. She didn't really want to move just yet. 

Tsunade frowned at her.

"Sakura, what are you doing here?" she asked as she set her hands on her hips.

The pink haired girl shrugged slightly.

She looked younger for a moment, more open, more innocent. But Tsunade blinked and it passed.

She sighed.

"I'm going to need you to leave for a bit child, I've got some tests to do." Tsunade told her gently.

Sakura nodded and sat up; his hand slid down her back.

She looked at him for a moment and her hand rose and hovered over his cheek for a moment. Then she pulled it back and stood up.

"You can come back tonight if you like." Tsunade said offhandedly as she pretended to be studying her clipboard. 

Sakura smiled a little and left.

~~~

Lee was doing his 685th out of 800 laps around the village when he spotted her as she rounded the hospital walls and started to walk along the village outskirts. 

"SAKURA-SAN!!!!!!!!!!" he yelled at the top of his lungs as he rushed towards her.

She turned, he eyes wide in surprise.

"Lee-san? What are you doing up this early in the morning?" she asked as she blinked at him.

"Early? Its already 8:30!" he responded.

She blinked again and then understanding dawned on her, Lee started the day at 4:30 am.

"Ah, you're right." She said, a small smile playing at the corner of her lips.

"Where have you been?" he asked her then his eyes wide with past worry. 

She felt guilty about not telling him goodbye when she had left.

"I've been wandering mainly. Saw some of the west of the country and traveled to the far north of the Cloud Country." She answered.

"Why did you go there?" he asked as he set his hands on his hips lightly and cocked his head to the side.

"I was searching for my sensei. Whom I found, incidentally." She answered easily.

"Your sensei?" he asked a little confused and then his eyes widened in happy surprise. "You mean Copy-ninja Kakashi! Gai-sensei's rival!" he exclaimed.

Sakura smiled a bit more and nodded.

"Gai-sensei will be so happy! He can finally even the score again! He was so upset when he thought he had lost the rivalry." Lee said; his eyes all wide and puppy dig like. 

Sakura suppressed a laugh and sobered.

"He won't be able to for a while, Kakashi-sensei's in a coma." She told him.

His face fell slightly.

"Well, at least he's not dead!" the boy exclaimed after a moment.

"No, thankfully he's not dead." Sakura agreed.

"Ne, Sakura-san?" he asked then, an eager expression painted across his face.

"Yes?" she responded.

"Would you like to train with me today?" he asked her.

She smiled softly at him; he really was a sweet boy. He hadn't said a word about her leaving without telling him. 

"I'm afraid I can't today. I'm recovering from a few injuries and Tsunade-sama said no training." She answered regretfully.

"Well, Tsunade-sama's orders must be obeyed. Your health comes first of course." He assured her.

"After you've recovered?" he asked then.

"After I have recovered, I would be glad to train with you again." She answered him gently. 

He grinned brightly.

"Alright! Well, I have to run, I still have 115 laps to finish! Bye bye!" he exclaimed as he rushed off again and waved at her.

She waved back and started to walk again.

She didn't understand Lee's fascination with her…maybe it was like her fascination with Sasuke…

_{Sasuke…}_

She sighed, definitely not her favorite topic at the moment. She'd have to face him eventually, that was certain, but she intended to delay it for as long as possible.   


	17. Human Connection

Disclaimer: Naruto isn't mine. Never has been, never will be.

A/N: Thank you to everyone who has reviewed the last few chapters and thank you so much to everyone who has been supporting me and helping me with this fic. Hmm…what to say about this chapter…I think Sasuke's still too ambiguous. I know I said I would try to fix that in this chapter but that didn't turn out so we'll try for it in the next one. Also…I was thinking maybe when this is over that I might write a prequel called "The Cocoon" which would be about Sakura's life with Kakashi and have a lot more of her relationship with Gaara…well, we'll see. I should finish this one before I start thinking of the next one, eh? Ok, so here goes chapter 17, hope you all enjoy ^^

~~~

The Butterfly: Chapter 17

By: Tea Leaf / Banana Soap

~~~

She walked along the edges of the village, preferring to avoid the morning bustle in the streets. Predictably, her feet found their way to the bridge. She walked to the middle and leaned against the railing as she looked up at the clear blue sky.

It was beautiful out today. 

"Nee-chan!" came a small voice and she turned and smiled at Mika as the little girl ran up to her. 

"Hey kiddo, how are you today?" she asked as she crouched down to the girl's level.

"Mika-chan is very good. How is Sakura nee-chan?" she asked brightly. 

"Sakura nee-chan's ok" she responded hesitantly. 

Her smile transferred to Gaara as he crouched down beside them too.

"Really?" he asked her as he took in the slight bruise like smudges under her eyes.

"Maybe." She answered.

"Does Sakura nee-chan want to walk with Mika-chan and nii-san?" the little girl asked hopefully as she put her hands on Sakura's knee.

"Yes please, thank you for offering." She answered.

She and Gaara straightened, and Mika grasped their hands and started to lead them over the bridge. 

Sakura shook her head in wonder at the girl. It was amazing how well she was recovering and moving on from her trauma. Gaara appeared to be a miracle worker when it came to healing. But then, she'd already known that.

They walked in a comfortable silence until they reached the field of the hero monument and Mika let go of their hands.

"Can Mika-chan play here nii-san?" she asked Gaara. He smiled and nodded at her and she tumbled into the long grass, hunting for grasshoppers. 

The two adults sat down back to back, resting their heads back on the other's shoulder as they looked up at the sky, watching the fluffy clouds roll by.

This was a familiar pass-time for them.

"So are you ok?" he asked after a moment.

"I'm not sure. Things are weird right now." She answered.

"How so?"

"Its Sasuke…I did something stupid and he reacted…and then he asked me about me and Kakashi and I told him something that he misunderstood again and I haven't talked to him since…" she answered, her words awkward.

Why was she feeling so tongue-tied lately? Nothing was coming out right.

"What did you do?" he asked.

"We got drunk…I kissed him…then we slept in the same bed, actually slept though nothing else…and I think he made more out of it then there was. And then I told him that it wasn't about him, it was just that I sleep better when there's someone else there. And he asked me how I learnt that…and then I evaded but he asked again and I told him a bit about me and Kakashi but…I don't know what really happened…" she responded.

"What did you tell him about you and Kakashi?" he asked.

"Just that we used to sleep in the same bed…and that I liked to sleep naked…" she answered, embarrassed.

"It was so stupid…I shouldn't have told him that." She continued. 

"Yeah, I can't imagine that would normally go over well." 

"It was weird though…he didn't say anything, he just walked away from me." She said, a pain she didn't want to admit to filtering into her voice.

Gaara winced in sympathy, being walked away from was one of the worst experiences a person could have.

"He probably just didn't know how to react. Did you explain it to him?" Gaara questioned now.

"No…I didn't know how…he wouldn't understand even if I did." She answered him.

"I don't think you give Sasuke enough credit. You should explain it to him, make him understand." He told her.

"Why should I even bother?" she muttered numbly. She felt like she was stuck in some cheesy soap opera with all this petty drama.

"Because you care." He answered.

"I don't want to care." 

"Yes you do. You're just afraid to."

She didn't respond. 

"Explain it to him. Make him understand. Force him to if it comes to that." Gaara ordered her gently.

She sighed and leaned more heavily against his back.

"Fine…" she muttered.

"Go do it now." He ordered her then.

She sighed painfully as leaned forward and then stood up.

"Thanks Gaara." She told him with a small smile and a slight wave as she walked off. 

Gaara sighed and lay back on the grass. He didn't really want her to finally sort things out with Sasuke; that meant she wouldn't really need him anymore. 

But at the end of day, she needed that closure. She needed things to be sorted out. And he knew that, he understood that and he wanted her to have that. She deserved it. 

The air was knocked out of his as Mika suddenly plopped down on his stomach and smiled at him.

He smiled back at her. 

~~~

She hesitated at the door. That sign was still there. This was her last chance to change her mind. 

But she couldn't, she had to go through with this. If nothing else, she owed it to the girl she had been seven years ago. She needed Sasuke to understand her.

She took a deep breath and opened the door softly and stepped in. The main floor was empty.

She closed the door behind her and slipped off her sandals. She gulped as she grasped the stair rail and walked up the steps.

She opened the door to his room and walked in. 

He was lying on the bed, watching her with that numb expression she recognized from the mirror.

She bit her lip as she stood at the foot of the bed, facing him.

He didn't move.

She opened her mouth to speak but nothing came out at first. She closed it again. 

He raised an eyebrow.

Why did she always have so much trouble expressing herself around him? 

She squared her shoulders and tried again.

"There is something you need to understand about me." She managed to say.

He didn't respond.

"You're not looking at me." She told him.

He frowned. "Yes I am." He said.

"No, you're looking through me." 

His frown deepened.

"You're not seeing me, you're seeing who you think I should be." She continued.

"Everyone has always looked through me…" she said then, as some emotion he couldn't really see in her expression rose up and clogged her throat.

She paused for a moment, collecting herself.

"What you need to understand is that I am not that ideal. I'm human just like everyone else." She said then looking directly into his eyes.

She looked away from him then.

"Back then…back then no one would treat me like I was a person. Not even you and Naruto. You treated me like I was made out of glass. But I'm not. And I…I really needed to be allowed to be human then but no one would acknowledge my humanity." She said.

Still he didn't move. He didn't know what to do or what to say.

His conscience told him that now would probably be a good time to simply say nothing at all and listen to her. 

This was the first time she'd opened up to him since he'd left.

"Kakashi-sensei…He was the only one who would look at me. He's the only who treated me as a human being." She started but stopped and tried again.

"I need to feel human, it tears me apart if I don't. I start to go numb and I hate that. I want to be alive and feel like everyone else." She said then.

"With Kakashi…it wasn't about any of the emotions that usually run relationships. It wasn't about love, it wasn't even about lust or sex. It wasn't about anything other than a human connection. He understood that I needed to feel human and he helped me. That's all that it was. It was just skin, just bodies." She said still looking away.

She was quiet for a moment but then snapped her eyes to his. 

"Stand up." She told him.

"What?" he asked, surprised with the sudden command.

"Just stand up." She repeated.

He frowned suspiciously but did as she requested and she walked over to him and grabbed the edges of his shirt, pulling it up.

"What are you doing?" he asked shocked as he tried to fight her hands away.

"Just trust me. Now quit fighting me and take off your shirt." She commanded as she kept tugging at it. 

With a slight growl of frustration he helped her tug it off.

She grabbed the edge of her own shirt and pulled it up over her head and then unhooked and dropped her bra.

He froze. What the hell was she doing?

She hooked her fingers in the belt loops of his pants and pulled him towards her until their chests were pressed against each other.

"See? Its just skin. Its just bodies." She told him as she looked up at him.

"No its not. Its _your_ skin and _your_ body against _mine_." He answered as looked straight ahead instead of at her.

"You're wrong. This is the same skin everyone has. These are the same bodies everyone else has. Don't you understand? That's the point." She told him softly as she wrapped her arms around his waist and hugged him to her.

His arms instinctively wrapped around her back.

She was right. He had always looked through her. But now with her body pressed against him, now that he could feel her physically, he was forced to look at her.    


	18. Tainted Blood

Disclaimer: Naruto, its characters, etc., do not belong to me. This is for entertainment purposes only so I'm not making any cash from it.

A/N: Thank yous and cookies for everyone who reviewed the last chapter, thank you all so much. I'm so glad that Saku/Sasu scene at the end was so well received ^-^-^-^ so here's the next chapter…some of it feels a little rushed but overall I'm pretty satisfied with it. I hope you all enjoy and I look forward to your reactions.

 Oh, and for those of you with AOL, I'm on tonight until around midnight eastern time so if any of you care to chat about the story or Naruto or whatever, drop me a line ^-^ (I'm CatAlmasy)

~~~

The Butterfly: Chapter 18

By: Tea Leaf / Banana Soap

~~~

Tsunade glared at the various vials in the rack in front of her. There were three, one with Sakura's blood, one with Mika's and one with Kakashi's. She'd tried everything she could think of but so far she hadn't found anything unusual.

Then it hit her. 

She grabbed a random minion who had been waiting outside the door.

"Get me Shikamaru and tell him to bring me any butterfly poison he has." She ordered.

The minion nodded and disappeared.

She should have thought of this sooner.

~~~

Shikamaru sighed in annoyance as he made his way towards the hospital labs. He was carrying a large box that held all the left over butterfly samples from he and Ino's experiments. 

"You rang?" he muttered sarcastically as he stepped into the room.

Tsunade looked up at him.

"Did you bring it?" she asked bluntly.

"Yep, everything's right here." He said as he set the box down on a clear counter.

She practically skipped over to it and opened it. She grinned as she grabbed a jar with butterfly wings in it. 

"Perfect!" she exclaimed.

She pulled on a pair of gloves and opened the jar. She grabbed a wing, rolled it and placed it in a vial of Sakura's blood.

The wing dissolved and the blood turned black. 

She tried to hold back her smile. 

She took another wing and put it in Mika's blood

The wing dissolved and the blood turned black.

She bit her lip.

She placed a wing in Kakashi's blood.

The wing didn't dissolve completely. Black spots appeared in the blood. 

Kakashi wasn't completely immune.

"Shikamaru, be a dear and fetch Sakura for me." She said sweetly as she continued to stare at the vile of Kakashi's blood.

"Fetch Sakura?" he asked, stunned and offended by the request.  

"1) Sakura left town remember? And 2) I'm a jounin, I don't do "go for" work." He responded with more attitude than Tsunade liked to hear from her subordinates. 

She snapped a glare at him.

"1) She has returned. She is most likely to be found at Uchiha's place. And 2) you will do whatever I tell you to do. Now go!" she commanded.

Shikamaru jumped and raised his hands placatingly.

"Ok, ok, no need to get upset." He said.

"Now." The Hokage growled at him.

He disappeared quickly with a small puff of smoke.

She had quite a few questions for that pink haired girl.

~~~

There was a knock on the door downstairs. She didn't move. He didn't want to move.

The pounding came again, louder, more insistent.

He glared and pulled away from her. Her arms dropped from his waist.

"I should answer that." He said briefly as he took one last look at her. She looked so…calm? 

He left the room and jogged down the stairs. He pulled the door open and dodged the hand that had been trying to knock again.

"Shikamaru? What do you want?" he asked suspiciously.

"Look man, I'm as inconvenienced as you are to be having to do this and I'm sorry and everything, I am, but Tsunade-sama wants to see Sakura right away and said she might be here." Shikamaru answered quickly in response to Sasuke's narrowed eyes. An ANBU member was not someone you wanted to be on the bad side of. 

"Tsunade-sama wants to see me?" Sakura said from behind him. He turned; she'd put her shirt back on before coming down.

"Yeah, she's at the hospital." Shikamaru answered her. 

She nodded and pulled on her sandals before slipping past Sasuke and leaving with Shikamaru.

He blinked. Then cursed. She'd left him behind. 

~~~

Once again, Sakura found herself sitting on an examination table waiting for Tsunade.

"Ah, Sakura, thank you for coming so quickly." Tsunade said as she opened the door and stepped in, closing the door again behind her.

"Tsunade-sama, if you don't mind my noting, you seem to have been spending a lot of time at the hospital lately. Who's running the village?" Sakura asked with sarcastic sweetness as she tipped her head to the side.

Tsunade grinned evilly.

"I enslaved Jiraiya and drafted Naruto to take care of business for me." 

Sakura blinked in surprise before shaking her head against the mental image of Jiraiya chained to the desk and scouting out the girls from the window as Naruto ran around with the Hokage hat on and sent papers flying everywhere.

"So, what do you need of me today?" Sakura asked directly.

"I have a good number of questions in regards to you and Kakashi's past interaction." She told her as she sat down in a chair facing the examination table.

"Such as?" she asked with a slight frown.

"Have you ever mixed blood?" Tsunade asked bluntly as she set her clipboard on her knees.

Sakura blinked as she was suddenly swamped with random images of bare flesh and blood.

"Umm…yes, probably." She answered hesitantly.

"A lot of blood?" the older woman asked.

"Maybe…" Sakura responded almost questioningly.

"Sakura, I need specifics. Why won't you give me a strait answer?" Tsunade exclaimed with frustration.

Sakura shrugged helplessly.

"Because at the time I wasn't paying attention to blood specifics. There have been several times when it's been possible that our blood had mixed. I don't know how much or even if any did." She answered honestly.

Tsunade sighed. 

"Well, I think it has, in fact, I think a significant amount must have mixed. While I was running tests on your blood, I discovered that butterflies dissolved in it and that it tuned black. In Kakashi's case, the butterfly wing I used only partially dissolved and only spots of black appeared in his blood." She told her.

Sakura blinked in surprise then frowned as she felt an unexpected pang in her stomach. She'd been doing experiments on her butterflies? She wiped the thought aside, that was unimportant at the moment.

"Tsunade-sama, I need to tell you something. I would have told you sooner but I only just realized it myself." She started.

Tsunade nodded for her to continue.

"For the weeks I traveled after my encounter with the gypsies, I often lost consciousness. Every time I did I relived memories from my time with Kakashi. And I know that's negligible normally but the only memories I ever had in those times involved Kakashi-sensei, none of my other memories had surfaced. But what was really weird was when I was in a coma for six days in the north I had a conversation with him. It wasn't a memory and I know I didn't imagine it because he told me things I didn't know about." She told her.

"Sakura, are you trying to say you have some kind of psychic connection with Kakashi?" Tsunade said condescendingly with an arched eyebrow, highly skeptical.

"I don't know, but I think its possible." She responded.

Tsunade frowned. How could there possibly be a subconscious connection? What could cause it? And if there was one, could that affecting the coma?

"Sakura, what other kind of contact have you had with Kakashi? Obviously there's blood contact. Anything else?" she asked her.

An image of blue bolts sizzling around the blood and the skin flashed in front of her eyes again.

Her inner self glared. _{Now is definitely not a good time for that memory!}_

"Umm…I think chakra. I think we may have exchanged chakra…maybe?" she said, she was really starting to feel uncomfortable.

"Chakra? How did you exchange chakra?" Tsunade asked absolutely perplexed.

She could feel the crimson heat creeping up her neck and engulfing her face.

She did not want to discuss this with Tsunade.

"Does it matter?" she asked hopefully.

"Yes, it does. I need a full understanding of the situation. Sakura, what are you hiding?" Tsunade ordered. She was getting very annoyed with this beating around the bush.

"I can't tell you." Sakura answered.

"You have to tell me Sakura, this is really important." The Hokage exclaimed.

"I can't." Sakura responded again as she looked down.

"Why not?!" 

Because you won't understand. 

_Because it's private, it belongs to he and I._

_Because that time it was more than humanity. _

She didn't answer, she continued to look down. 

Tsunade glared at her. She didn't have time for this.

"Damnit Sakura, I don't want to have to do this but you aren't leaving any choice…" she said as she stood and performed several quick seals with her hands.

Chakra glowed at her fingertips.

"Mind-meld jutsu" she said as she placed her fingertips to Sakura's skull and shifted through her memories, her eyes growing steadily wider as she learnt it all.

She gasped at the last one and stepped back, raising her hands to her mouth.

Sakura couldn't look at her. 

She jumped off the table and disappeared.

Tsunade was in shock still. She had never suspected that…

But it certainly explained a lot.

~~~

He sat at his kitchen table with a large mug of steaming black coffee between his hands. 

His mind was a mess.

He took a sip of the scalding, bitter brew hoping it would help clear his thoughts.

She'd made it clear that he wasn't the one important to her. Everyone was important to her but in a mass and general sense of it being just a different body that mattered to her. Everyone was interchangeable to her. Everyone as individuals meant nothing to her now.

His jaw tensed as he looked down.

He wasn't important to her anymore. She, the one he had come to rely on as the only one who believed he was truly worthwhile, didn't think he was important anymore.

He took another sip of his coffee. 

But she had told him. She had told him that about herself. That had to mean something right?

_{For pete's sake, enough with the self-pity and grasping at straws already! Take what she'll give you and roll with it.}_ his ego complained.

His conscience rolled his eyes.

_{He's not grasping at straws and wallowing in self-pity you idiot! He's trying to understand the situations and her motivations behind it. I think the fact that she told you at all means you at least mean something because she cares whether or not you understand her.}_ Conscience responded rationally.

_{What-ever man, I think she just doesn't want you to think she's a dirty whore when she tries to jump your bones.}_ Ego countered.

_{What the hell is the matter with you?!}_ Conscience exclaimed before kicking Ego in the stomach.

_{You're primitive brain must still be on overload from her demonstration earlier.}_ Conscience muttered to the incapacitated Ego before turning his speech back to Sasuke.

_{She's not about to "jump your bones" as my counter-part so eloquently expressed it. She may eventually (emphasis on eventually) want to sleep with you in that sense but seriously, I don't think that will happen any time soon.} _Conscience told him.

Sasuke lifted a brow as he took another sip of coffee.

_{Besides, you have more important things to deal with at the moment, such as the fact that she doesn't appear to be in love with you anymore. Further more, she might be in love with Kakashi Hatake, and seriously, are you really going to let that perverted old man take her from you without at least attempting to fight?}_ Conscience continued.

_{Now who's being primitive?}_ Ego said sarcastically.

_{Excuse me?}_ Conscience said dangerously.

_{Dude, you're trying to make him jealous! That's one of those base emotions that qualify as a deadly sin, remember? And you're trying to make him resort to fighting, also a primitive means to an end.}_ Ego said smugly.

Conscience glared and dived at Ego.

Sasuke shook his head, trying to clear the ensuing dust cloud as the pair battled it out.

He sighed and took another sip of coffee.

_{You guys are useless…}_ he thought to them.

~~~

Sakura crashed through the woods as she ran to the field.

She felt so violated.

_{That bitch raped our memories!!}_ her inner self screamed in outrage.

She broke through the tree line and collapsed to her knees in the butterfly field. They were fluttering peacefully in the sunshine.

She looked to her right; her kunai was still there, jammed in the ground.

She reached for it and ripped it out with her right hand and sliced it across her left palm.

That didn't count as real cutting right?

The blood pooled in her palm. 

The butterflies flew to her. 


	19. Playing for Keeps

Disclaimer: Naruto is not mine so please don't sue me, I'm poor ^^()

A/N: I'm sorry for the late update today, I had a major plot roadblock earlier and it took me a while before I could sort it out. Huge thanks and hugs go out to Fly, Fanartist and Wicked_Innuendo for helping me work through it. I hope you all like the final result. 

Well, you guys are gonna get mad at the end of this chapter again…Oh well there are good things in it that I hope will make you like it anyway. 

I also got some new Naruto fanart done while I was brainstorming for this chapter and it can be found on Mediaminer in the Naruto fanart section, by Banana Soap. Also, if you're into some really cool Rurouni Kenshin fanfiction check out Tsuki-san's site here: http:// www. tsukisan46. com/ heartoftheflamingsword. html (this is the site where the drawing of butterfly Sakura will be used in the design of the original fiction section).

Anyways, thanks again to everyone who has reviewed the past chapters and waited patiently for this one, I hope you all enjoy!

~~~

The Butterfly: Chapter 19

By: Tea Leaf / Banana Soap

~~~

Sasuke sighed. His Ego and Conscience were both passed out and severely beaten.

_{Well, at least now they won't harass me…}_ he thought.

He took another sip of coffee. This was his fifth cup. The muscles in his forearms twitched slightly from the caffeine. 

He'd been sitting here for hours and still didn't know what to make of things.

He was pretty sure she cared about him on some level seeing as how she had gone through the trouble of explaining herself to him.

He was pretty sure he cared about her on some level seeing as he had felt relieved after hearing her explanation. 

His ego had also pointed out that he was also attracted to her, but he'd known that for a long time now.

The question now was where they stood with each other and where was it going to go from here. 

He really didn't know. 

There was a sharp pounding on the door.

_{Is everyone in Konoha illiterate?}_ he thought to himself with annoyance as he stood up. 

_{They must be seeing as none of them manage to read the damn sign on the door…}_

 He opened the door.

"Now what?" he asked surlily.

The chuunin on his doorstep glared at him.

"Bro sent me to give you this!" Konohamaru said importantly as he handed him a scroll.

"Why did Naruto send you?" he asked condescendingly.

The 3rd's grandson glared at him.

"The 5th is very occupied with reviving the legendary Copy-Ninja so the pervert sennin and bro are running the office." Konohamaru answered.

Sasuke frowned as a mental image of Jiraiya chained to Tsunade's desk while scoping girls from the window as Naruto ran around with the Hokage hat on and sent papers flying everywhere, popped into his head.

"What is it?" he asked then about the scroll.

"Top Secret Mission! Bro wouldn't even tell me what it was and said that if I tried to open it and look I'd be in worse shape than the copy ninja." Young teen answered, his eyes widening in apprehension.

_{A mission?}_ he thought to himself.

"Fine, you may leave." Sasuke responded before turning back into the house and closing the door in Konohamaru's indignant face.

~~~

Sakura sat in the sunny field, comforted by the familiar sound of fluttering wings and the slight breezes they created around her.

This was one thing that no one could steal from her. This was hers alone. Only she could touch the butterflies.

"Pwetty flutterbies!" a small voice exclaimed from behind her and Sakura whipped around in time to see a large crimson and black butterfly land in Mika's small, outstretched hands.

Mika smiled brightly at the insect, fascinated by its bright pattern.

Sakura felt the color drain from her face. 

Even the butterflies weren't hers.

"See Sakura nee-chan! Mika-chan told you the butterflies no hurt." The little girl said sweetly.

Gaara rushed up then, he'd lost sight of Mika for a moment. He froze as he saw the butterfly in her hands.

His eyes widened as he looked to the side and saw Sakura. All the color had drained from her face, her eyes were slightly blood shot and small black veins were starting to spider under her now translucent skin.

She stood up. The butterflies that had been surrounding her scattered.

She stared at Mika. Mika's smile fell. 

"Sakura nee-chan looks scary…" the little girl said in a wobbly voice.

Gaara sent a small dart of sand at the butterfly in Mika's hand and scooped the little girl up into his arms.

Sakura stared at them, her eyes haunted.

Something was snapping in her mind and she couldn't let it.

She formed a quick seal with her hands and disappeared.

Mika hugged Gaara's neck tightly as she tried not to sniffle too loudly.

~~~

She was running. She shouldn't be but she didn't care. She burst through the front door of the house and quickly scanned the main floor; it was empty.

She bounded up the stairs and burst into his bedroom. He was there.

"Sasuke!" she breathed as she ran up to him and threw her arms around him.

He blinked in surprise at first then frowned.

"Sakura, what's wrong? What happened?" he asked, concern coloring his voice as he held the distraught girl to him.

She didn't answer; she simply clung to him for a moment. Then she noticed what he was wearing and pulled back slightly to get a better look.

"Why are you wearing your ANBU uniform?" she asked softly.

"I have a mission…" he responded, frowning more when Sakura pulled away from him even more, taking a few steps back.

"Oh." She said simply. 

"Sakura, are you ok?" He asked as he took a step towards her.

She took another step back and nodded, making a small, affirmative noise.

"Don't lie to me." He told her seriously.

"I'll be fine. What's you mission?" she asked, changing the subject as she wrapped her arms around her stomach.

"I can't tell, top secret." He responded warily. He wanted to go over to her but she looked so rattled that he wasn't sure how she would react. 

She nodded and gave him a slightly forced smile.

"I understand. Good luck." She told him, her smile brittle and shaking slightly.

Her whole body was shaking.

"Sakura…" he began as he tried to take another step towards her.

Again she stepped back.

There was a knock on the door. It was time for him to go.

He frowned.

"I'll be back in a few days." He told her as he grabbed his katana and strapped it to his back.

"We'll talk then, ok?" he said.

She nodded and tried to smile again, this one a little more stable. 

He grabbed his mask and headed down the stairs, slipping it on as he left the house.

She listened to him go, her eyes still stinging with tears she refused to let fall. 

She stumbled over to the perfectly made bed, he was so neat, and flopped onto it. She grabbed his pillow and hugged it close, curving her body into a ball around it.

It smelt like him. Clean and crisp, a hint of orange from his shampoo…the stinging in her eyes increased and her throat became sore.

Everything was being taken from her. Tsunade had taken Kakashi from her. Mika had taken the butterflies from her. ANBU had taken Sasuke from her.

Why couldn't there be something she could just keep to be hers and hers alone?

~~~

Sasuke frowned at Konohamaru.

"What are you doing here?" he asked him.

"Bro sent me to make sure you left on time." The kid answered, attitude on full.

Sasuke's eyes narrowed behind his mask. He hesitated on the step then looked back at the house. His jaw set.

He took off quickly for the Hokage tower.

"Hey! You're going the wrong way!" Konohamaru yelled before racing after him.

Sasuke pulled off his mask before practically flying through the doors of Tsunade-sama's office.

He froze.

There was Jiraiya chained to the desk and spying out the window. And there was Naruto wearing the Hokage hat as he sifted through the bookshelves and sent papers flying everywhere.

Both occupants of the room turned to look at him.

Konohamaru pushed his way past the ANBU member.

"I'm sorry bro! I went to get him just like you said but then he came here! I told him this was the wrong way to go, but he didn't listen!" the young teen explained quickly.

Naruto and Jiraiya both raised an eyebrow at Sasuke.

"Is there something wrong?" Jiraiya asked him.

Sasuke blinked the shook his head to clear it.

"Yeah, I can't do the mission." He answered.

"What?" Naruto and Jiraiya answered with surprise.

"Yeah, something came up and I can't leave right now." He continued.

"Sasuke, this is a really important mission and you're all we have available at the moment." The pervert sennin told him as he turned away from the window and faced the Uchiha survivor.

"I know, I understand. Can't you send Kiba? He's ANBU and I know he's in town." He asked, his voice betraying nothing of his anxiousness to get back to his house.

"Kiba just got back from a mission that took two months, he's on vacation." Jiraiya answered.

"He was complaining about being bored and that vacation shouldn't be imposed." He told Jiraiya before turning to Naruto "and seeing as he's got so much spare time at the moment, he's been renewing old acquaintances and hanging out with Hinata." 

Naruto's eyes narrowed as flames fired up in them and his hackles stood on end.

Jiraiya looked at Naruto nervously and then glared at Sasuke, he'd bet money that Kiba was doing no such thing and that this spoiled brat had said it simply to gain Naruto's support.

"So, here's the scroll back." He said as he tossed it to Jiraiya and turned, running back the way he'd come before anyone could respond.

Tsunade was going to be pissed at him when she found out he had just ditched duty but…this was more important.

~~~

Her eyes blinked in surprise as she heard the front door being thrown open followed by pounding on the steps.

He froze in the doorway and something clogged his throat as he saw her huddled there in the middle of the bed. She just looked so small, so lost. 

"Hi." He said simply as he leaned against the doorway, his chest laboring with deep breaths as his heart pounded away. 

She sat up and stared at him.

"Hi." She answered.

"I…I thought you said you had a mission?" she said softly, confusion flooding her previously empty eyes that she kept locked on him as he moved closer.

"I did." He said as he sat down facing her on the bed.

"Then…why are you still here?" she asked, frowning slightly.

"I declined." He answered.

"You what?!" Her voice raised slightly with shock as her eyes widened with incomprehension. A ninja simply did not decline a mission, especially not a ninja as highly ranked as Sasuke. 

"I declined. And then I baited Naruto and left before anyone could tell me I wasn't allowed to decline." He answered, a slight smirk curving his lips.

A wobbly smile and finally a real smile spread across her face.

This was the first time she had truly smiled at him in seven years.

He smiled back. 

She leaned forward and leaned her forehead on his shoulder as she felt laughter start to bubble up from her throat. He wrapped his arms around her back pulling her more firmly against him. She wrapped her arms around his waist and snuggled up to him.

"So, what's wrong?" he asked her.

"You just fixed it" She answered into his neck.

Conscience and Ego applauded.

~~~

Tsunade sat in a chair facing Kakashi's comatose form. 

Sakura's blood explained why he'd survived the poison. 

The last night he'd spend with Sakura before he'd left on the mission explained he and Sakura's connection. 

She looked away as she felt a pang of guilt flash through her. She shouldn't have stolen that memory from Sakura. She had no right to have any knowledge of that moment. 

But now that she did she couldn't wipe it from her mind and she couldn't help but feel a little jealous. She'd lost that kind of passion a long time ago.

She shook her head to clear it and turned back to the problem at hand.

She was reasonably sure that Kakashi was comatose because he hadn't been completely immune to the butterfly poison. 

She knew that the younger butterflies of this species had weaker poison, the first causing sleep and warm skin, the second causing paralysis and minor burns, the third killing and melting flesh. 

Kakashi didn't have any burns but his skin was warm to the touch even though he himself wasn't giving off that much body heat. He was also in a coma, a state of both sleep like and paralysis like. 

The questions that remained were 1) why did his skin react to Sakura's skin and flare in that particular pattern and 2) had he really moved his hand when she had found Sakura here this morning?

She sighed as the dying light of the sun filtered in through the hospital curtains.

There was also the question of what the hell had happened that he would encounter these butterflies to begin with but she figured that wouldn't be answered until he woke up.

So now the most important question: How to wake him up?

The poison itself had been washed off several times but was constantly renewing itself. That suggested that there was something inside creating this poison. It was probably this constant regeneration of the poison that was keeping him in this state.

Tsunade frowned. The pattern that flared across Kakashi's skin every time Sakura touched him was the same pattern on the butterfly wings _and_ the same pattern that had spread across Sakura's skin when she had joined with the butterfly all those years ago during the battle with Orochimaru. 

Could a butterfly have joined with Kakashi? If so, then how could she get it out? 

 She remembered that in Sakura's case, the butterfly had been bled out in sheer luck when the three shirukens had hit her back.

But that had been an accident; they hadn't known the butterfly had been there, it just fortunately had. How was she going to find a dissolved butterfly in Kakashi's bloodstream, assuming of course that there even was one? 

Then she remembered her earlier experiments. The butterflies didn't fully dissolve in Kakashi's blood. She'd be able to find it. 

Now, how to scan Kakashi's blood? Tsunade frowned.

The image of chakra cackling like lightning and stemming from open wounds flashed into her head. 

She grinned, that memory was proving to be more useful than anticipated.

She would bounce chakra through his blood stream and feel around for any obstruction, the obstruction would presumably be the butterfly. 

She looked at the window again; the sun was almost completely below the horizon now. She would start the procedure in the morning.

Right now she had to go and make sure Jiraiya and Naruto hadn't caused too much damage at the office.

~~~

The fading light filtered in through the curtains that covered the windows. The shadows were steadily growing and consuming the room.

But they didn't care. 

Today the shadows didn't hold any nightmares for them. Today, the shadows crept in and coated them like a soft blanket. It was peaceful.

The were lying on the bed, he on his back, she half on top of him with her ear over his heart and her arm encircling his chest, his arms were around her back, holding her to him as one hand idly played with her long strands of cotton-candy pink hair. 

They hadn't talked much since he had come back to the room, neither really had much to say at the moment.

_{You know, now is probably a really good opportunity to find out more about her…}_ his conscience suggested.

His ego snorted. _{Yeah, like what color underwear is she wearing, better yet, how does she look with them off? She might go for it, I mean there was that moment earlier--}_

Ego was literally cut off as Conscience threw a couple dozen kunai, shirukens and other small and sharp projectiles at him.

Sasuke rolled his eyes. But they were right; he couldn't waste this opportunity, he had to do _something_.


	20. Reacting

Disclaimer: Nope, Naruto still isn't mine.

A/N: Good news folks, this fic is officially qualified to be posted on AFF! In other words, this is a lemon 0holds out an yellow citrus fruitThis is a lemon points to a perfectly fine looking car that breaks down every five minutesThis, is a lemon points to 1st scene of chapter 20 of the fic

So, this chapter contains scenes with graphic sexuality, reader discretion is advised. Due to 's policies on lemons, the lemon from this chapter has been cut. If you would like to read it, it is available on both aff and mediaminer. The links are in my profile.

And a huge thank you, hug and cookie go to Fly for helping me write it.

Thanks again to everyone who has been reviewing, especially you, my devoted readers who review every chapter. I can't express how much it means to me. So I'll just have to settle for the inadequacies of Thank you.

Oh, and about the cut on Sakura's hand and Sasuke's arm band things from the ANBU uniform…seeing as I forgot to write it in, we'll just say that those were taken care of in the last chapter sometime between when Sasuke got back and they laid down on the bed…work?

So here's the latest chapter, sorry for the lateness, I've been out of the house a lot of the day and was suffering a migraine for a while. But here it is, and I'll see you all next time -

The Butterfly: Chapter 20

By: Tea Leaf / Banana Soap

As it turned out, he didn't have to do anything.

She shifted suddenly, moving to lie fully on top of him and sliding upwards against him slightly so that their eyes were even.

Her arms were crossed over his chest, lifting her up slightly.

She watched him for a moment, a small secret smile playing on her lips.

He raised his eyebrow slightly at her.

Her smile widened as she pressed her lips to his. Just a soft, chaste contact at first but soon they parted slightly and she pulled his bottom lip between hers, sucking on it gently as he responded by doing the same to her upper one.

/scene cut out here/

She kept her eyes open with sheer force of will. She didn't want to fall asleep. She didn't want to wake up and find out it wasn't real.

Her arms were around his shoulders and neck, holding him to her tightly, his weight pressing her into the mattress.

She loved the full body contact. She loved that he had fallen asleep on her. Part of her didn't want him to wake up, that part just wanted to stay like this forever.

Her eyelids were heavy and she fought off a yawn. Her whole body felt heavy but it was her heart that was the heaviest.

Another part of her wanted to fall asleep and wanted this to be dream. She didn't want to have to deal with the repercussions of tonight. She didn't want to reopen the huge can of worms that constituted her relationship with him. She wanted to be over him.

But she'd never really been over him. She would never really be over him. And in the darkness, she could admit that to herself.

Her arms tightened a bit around him. Now that she could hold on to him, she didn't want to let him go.

Darkness coated the room, alleviated briefly by the faint glimmer of moonlight that filtered through the gauzy curtains. It was warm and secluded, this room. It felt cut off from the rest of the world.

She sighed softly and allowed her eyes to drift shut. Right now she didn't have to let him go. So right now, she wouldn't.

Tsunade adjusted her surgical mask as she stared at the bare slab on which Kakashi rested. His condition hadn't changed. He still looked like a corpse.

He lay naked on the metallic table except for a blanket that hid his body from the waist down. Spidery runes had been painted all over his torso, a large symbol painted over his heart.

Her jaw set beneath her mask. Hopefully, her theory was right and by day's end, Kakashi would be back to his conscious, living self again.

She closed her eyes and performed several seals with her hands. Chakra crackled from her right hand's fingertips. She placed them on his skin, filling the spaces in the pattern that covered his heart.

The words on his skin began to glow and then rushed up Tsunade's fingertips before being channeled into the symbol over Kakashi's heart and disappearing into his blood stream.

Her eyes closed as she gave her utmost concentration to the task at hand.

His eyes cracked open and he winced slightly at the bright sunlight filtering through the window.

But then he smirked. Smugly. He couldn't help it.

His hand reached out beside him expecting to find another body occupying the bed and frowned when he discovered himself alone.

_Where did she---_ The thought didn't bother to finish itself as the sound of rushing water reached his ears from the direction of the bathroom.

He smirked again.

His ego did too.

He dragged his still naked body out from under the covers of the bed and paused to laugh at himself as he caught a glimpse of his reflection. His hair looked like a rats nest, there was a bluish mark on the curve of his jaw near his right ear and there were several scratch marks on his shoulders and chest. He shook his head and walked into the bathroom. Steam assaulted him.

He glared slightly; she was going to use up all the hot water.

Well, if she didn't intend to leave any hot water for him, he'd simply share her hot water.

He walked over to the shower stall, opened the door and stepped in.

She whipped around and stared at him.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

"Conserving water." He answered as he moved her out of the way of the hot spray, enjoying the look of the few lingering suds of soap that clung to her wet skin before letting the scalding water wash over him.

She blinked at him for a second, still a little shocked before uttering and indignant "Hey!" and trying to shove him out of the way of the hot spray. He caught her against him easily.

"Good morning." He said before sealing his lips to hers.

She blinked again, taken by surprise once more. She smiled.

"Good morning." She answered as she pulled his head down for another kiss.

A little while and all the hot water later, they found themselves in the kitchen, he in a pair of drawstring pajama pants, she in one of his white button down shirts, both enjoying large cups of coffee as they sat across from each other at the table.

Sakura was sure she was glowing, she felt like she was glowing. She just couldn't seem to wipe the smile off her face or stop looking at him. She really did love to look at him. _That mark looks so sexy on his jaw_ her inner self smirked.

Sasuke was definitely glad he had turned down that mission. He really didn't care what Tsunade tried to do to punish him for it, he'd be able to take it, he felt invincible. His ego was reclining with a definite smirk of satisfaction; his conscience was still in that happy daze mode. He himself was feeling a good deal of both.

He looked back at her across the table. That was how she was supposed to look. Her eyes were bright and open, colored a vibrant shade of sea foam green. Her cheeks had a little color to them; her lips were still a bit swollen. And she was smiling; she was smiling that soft smile he remembered from when they were twelve. That smile she had always saved for him, complimented by his mark that beat with her pulse at the base of her throat.

Neither of them could really think of anything to say at the moment so they simply said nothing and enjoyed the moment.

Tsunade crashed onto the bed in one of the empty sickrooms. She was drained. It had taken her longer than she'd thought to find any lasting traces of the butterfly. It appeared to have been steadily dissolving more and more as time had passed.

The good news though, she'd found the damn insect regardless. So, assuming the rest of her theory was correct as well, all she had to do now was remove the creature and cleanse Kakashi's system of the poison and he would wake up.

The bad news was that the butterfly had lodged itself in a vein that ran along his spinal cord, and was specifically stuck beside the nervous cord that ran through the vertebrae at the base of his skull.

The operation was going to be very dangerous.

She reached out an exhausted hand and pushed the nurse call button. A few moments later a young woman in a pristine uniform stepped through the door.

"Yes, Godaime-sama?" the young woman questioned.

"I'm going to rest for a few hours. I'm going to need a message send out to a few people around the village." She began.

The nurse pulled out a pen and a pad and jotted down the instructions.

A loud pounding came from the door.

Sasuke and Sakura both glared at it, how dare someone interrupt their morning afterglow!

"You know, ever since I put up that sign I seem to be getting harassed even more. I think it must be baiting them." Sasuke muttered as he stood up.

Sakura laughed softly as she watched him go to the door.

There was a brief, muffled conversation followed by the sound of ripping paper and the door closing.

He walked back into the kitchen holding a note in one hand while the other one crumpled up the "Go Away" sign and tossed it into the trash bin.

"What is it?" she asked him as he came back to the table.

"It's from Tsunade. Says that she's figured out what's wrong with Kakashi and that a surgery will be required. However, the surgery is highly risky and so she's suggesting we come and see him before he goes under the knife." He answered as he tossed the note over to her.

She picked it up and read it carefully as her forehead creased into a frown and she bit her lip. Worry clouded her previously clear eyes.

Sasuke watched her, trying very hard to ignore the steel band that had returned its vise-like grip around his lungs.


	21. Operation

Disclaimer: Naruto still isn't mine so please don't sue me. I'm poor, I swear.

A/N: Thank you to everyone who reviewed the last chapter, I loved reading them. And here's the next one, it's a little shorter but I think it turned out well anyway. I hope you all like it and I look forward to your reactions ^_^

~~~

The Butterfly: Chapter 21

By: Tea Leaf / Banana Soap

~~~

The rest of the morning was spent under the ominous shadow of Kakashi's impending operation. The comfort and sunshine they had been enjoying earlier had been obliterated.

Sakura spend a good deal of the time in the spare bedroom going through a few things that she had kept buried in the bottom of the pack she had taken with her on her journey. 

Sasuke stayed in the kitchen. He had gone up to see her but had felt uncomfortable, like he was intruding in something that wasn't meant to be intruded upon by him. So he'd gone to his room and gotten dressed before coming back to the kitchen and having another cup of coffee. And another. And another. Until suddenly the pot was empty and he had developed a twitch under his left eye due to the caffeine. 

He stared at the clock. Kakashi's operation was due to start at 3:30, an hour from now. He heard soft feet on the steps and looked through the kitchen door to see her descend. Her shirt had a high collar and was hiding his mark. Her arms were bandaged, hiding her scars. Her hair was pulled back into a braid, not loose and flowing like he liked. 

She was carrying a small bag in her arms. He didn't know what was in it, he wasn't supposed to. 

His slightly unstable hand grasped his now empty mug as he stood up and he placed it in the sink as he past it on his way to the foot of the stairs where she stood. 

She tried to smile a bit but he could see the fear and worry still plaguing her. He tried to smile reassuringly as the vise around his lungs tightened. 

He motioned to the door, she nodded and stepped past him to pull on her sandals, he did the same and they left.

They walked slowly side by side, she was limping slightly having aggravated her leg the day before. 

Still they said nothing, neither really capable of figuring out what would be the appropriate thing to say. So the silence stretched and the tension thickened between them.

The reached the hospital and he pulled the door open for her. She hesitated for an instant before walking in. They went to the desk and signed in before heading to Kakashi's room. 

They blinked as they saw Gai sitting beside the bed and grasping one of Kakashi's hands as tears streamed down his face. They'd caught him in the middle of an impassioned speech about how their eternal rivalry could not end now and so he was sure that Kakashi would pull through the operation or some such thing. Neither of them could really hear anything beyond the resonating heart beats in their ears.

Sasuke moved into the room and took a seat opposite Gai, on the other side of Kakashi's bed and stared at the comatose Jounin thoughtfully. 

She stayed at the door. She couldn't go in. She stared at his corpse. Part of her didn't believe he could ever revive from this. Part of her was afraid he never would. 

She stepped back from the doorway and leaned against the wall on the outside of the room. 

She clutched her package to her chest and slid down the wall to sit on the floor. 

"Sakura!" came a loud voice and she looked up as Naruto waved at her. She smiled back slightly.

He crouched down beside her on the floor and laid his hand on the top of her head.

"Don't worry Sakura-chan, Kakashi-sensei will be fine. That old hag is a brilliant doctor; do you remember the operation she did on Lee after Gaara crushed his limbs? That went perfectly and this operation isn't nearly as complicated. It'll go great and Kakashi will be sleeping in and being late for training sessions again in no time." He reassured her brightly.

She smiled as a slight laugh escaped her throat.

"Thanks Naruto" she told him as he settled himself down on the floor beside here.

"Aren't you going to go in?" she asked.

"Why? Its not like this is going to be the last time I see him alive. Besides, I heard Gai's bawling from all the way down the hall and I'm really not in the mood to be scarred for life by the image of him crying over Kakashi." He answered her with slightly wide eyes. She laughed a little again.

"Yeah, it was something of a disturbing sight." She answered.

Sasuke heard her laugh and the vise tightened painfully. 

~~~

The waiting was killing her. 

Tsunade had come to them at precisely 3:30 and had explained the operation and the dangers to them. Best case scenario, Kakashi would be fine. Scenario to be expected, Kakashi would be paralyzed from the neck down. Worst case scenario, Kakashi would die.

She didn't want him to die. Not now. It wouldn't be fair if he died now. 

Gai was pacing, unable to sit still for more than a second. 

She, Sasuke and Naruto were all standing, leaning against the wall that faced the window that normally looked down onto the operation room. Curtains had been drawn closed across the glass. They couldn't risk Tsunade being distracted by anything. 

She was still shocked by the nature of the operation. How had one of her butterflies, no wait, they weren't her butterflies anymore. 

A pang of loss clenched in her stomach. 

How could one of the butterflies have gone into Kakashi's bloodstream? What had the butterflies been doing around him? Had they followed him? Had they intentionally tried to hurt him? Had they saved him?

What had happened to him?

She didn't know. Tsunade didn't know. Nobody knew anything. 

_{What happened to you?} _

_"It's a long story. I'll tell you when I wake up."_

His voice echoed in her head. She bit her lip as her eyes began to sting slightly. She shifted and leaned against Sasuke's shoulder, her hand finding his at his side and tangled their fingers. 

He rested his chin on the top of her head.

Naruto raised an eyebrow at them.

Sasuke narrowed his eyes at him. 

Gai paced on.

And so they waited. 

~~~

Sweat beaded on her forehead as she made a delicate incision. She pulled the skin away from the area slightly so that she would have better access. 

There it was. She could see the small lump in the vein. She took a deep breath as an assistant sponged her forehead.

She set down her scalpel and made a quick seal with her hands, finishing with her finger pointing to the correct vein. The blood flow would be temporarily blocked in it.

She picked up a smaller scalpel and took a good number of steadying breaths; this was the tricky part, slicing the vein without slicing anything else. 

 She lowered the knife, her hand steady and broke the surface of the tube easily with her sharp instrument. She pulled back carefully. 

The incision was made without any problems. So far, so good. Now she just had to make sure she didn't hit the corded nerves as she removed the butterfly. 

She set down the smaller scalpel as picked up a pair of long tweezers. She lowered them carefully into the incision and clamped them down onto the wing fragment. 

She pulled slowly and carefully, her hand never wavering. 

The butterfly came out. She pulled it away from the dangerous area without any problems and placed the bloody and now dead insect on a tray and set down the tweezers.

She formed another seal with her hands and placed her open palm about an inch above the surgical area. The small incision in the vein sealed itself. 

She formed another series of seals and pointed to the vein, a small string of chakra left her fingertip and reactivated the blood flow of the vein. 

Her face was still impassive; she wasn't finished yet.

She removed the small clamps that stretched the skin away from the area. She grasped a needle and thread and carefully stitched the inch long cut. 

She stepped away and breathed easier. Complete. Success.

~~~

Her grip tightened almost painfully as Tsunade walked towards them. 

The older woman smiled as she got closer and her knees went weak in relief, she would have fallen had he not caught her.

"The operation was a success. The obstruction has been removed without any damage having been done to his nervous system." The Hokage told them.

Gai and Naruto cheered loudly and did a happy dance as she sagged more in his arms. 

She felt light headed, like some huge weight had just disappeared from her shoulders and mind.

He didn't react. 

"However" Tsunade began. Gai and Naruto froze, she tensed again.

"There is still a significant amount of poison in his system that we have yet to cleanse so he is still comatose." She continued.

"We will let you know when the detoxification process is complete." The Hokage told them before turning and walking back down the hall. 

Sasuke helped Sakura to a chair and crouched down beside her. She held on to his hand tightly with both of hers.

Things were better but things weren't over yet. They still had to cleanse the poison, assuming of course they even could. She bit her lip.

Sasuke frowned slightly and squeezed her hand gently.

~~~

Again, runes spidered across his naked skin and he lay on a bare metal table covered from the waist down with a flimsy hospital sheet. 

Tsunade stood at the head of the table, still in her operation scrubs. 

She took several calming breaths, centering herself. She concentrated on her chakra flow, gathering it into her hands. 

She performed a long, complicated series of seals then placed her hands on his head: forefingers and middle fingers over his eyes, ring fingers and pinkies fanned out to his temples, thumbs together on the bridge of his nose, palms resting on his forehead. 

She closed her eyes in concentration, sending her chakra flowing through his body, pushing the poison into the runes that covered his skin. 

The runes, once red, slowly turned black. She felt the connection between them close and opened her eyes. All the runes were now pitch black, the poison had been moved from inside of him and into the symbols. Perfect.

She called in a few nurses and together they started scrubbing off the runes, washing the poison off of him. 

~~~

Everyone stared with intense eyes as Tsunade walked down the hall towards them again.

"He is currently recovering from the surgery. He's asleep." She told them as she came up to them.

"Asleep? Are you sure he's not still in a coma?" Naruto asked her.

"There are signs of active and conscious brain activity and he has recovered mobility. So yes, we're sure he's just asleep." She answered.

Sakura looked at her hopefully.

"Yes you may visit him but you are not allowed to wake him up" she said with a stern glare at Naruto. 

Naruto snapped his fingers, she'd caught him. 

~~~

Ho couldn't remember ever feeling so rested. He smiled slightly at the hand that was stroking his hair and the sweet scent that was enveloping him. She was waiting for him.

He opened his eyes slowly and looked at her.

His eyes snapped wide and he yelled in shock as Gai's face flooded his vision.

"KAKASHI!!!" Gai yelled out as he grasped his rival in a bear hug and happy tears spilled down his cheeks.

Team 7 sweat dropped at the ensuing sparkles.

Kakashi tried to pull away but three years without moving had left him with very little actual physical strength.

_{Ok, That was not what I had hoped to see} _he thought to himself.

"Gai, get off of me." He said still trying his best to pry the man off of him.

Gai finally leg go of his death grip and grabbed Kakashi's hands.

"Now that you are back in the village, our rivalry must continue! I challenge you to a competition of your choice." He said vibrantly.

Kakashi sighed.

"Gai, now's a really bad time." He answered.

His fellow jounin frowned in confusion.

"Gai, he's been in a coma for the past three years, he'll be needing some pretty extreme physiotherapy before he can do any competitions with you." Tsunade said from the other side of the bed where she was checking some machines and making notes on her clipbard.

"Oh, right. After your recovery then!" he insisted.

"Fine." Kakashi consented reluctantly attempting to pull his hands away from Gai's. 

"You're late." Came a timid voice from the doorway.

Kakashi looked over and smiled slightly as he spotted Sakura there looking at him cautiously, her arms wrapped around a package she held pressed to her chest.

"Sorry 'bout that" he said as he scratched the back of his head weakly. "I got lost on the way back." 

"Liar!" she said, a smile starting to creep across her lips as Naruto echoed the word and stepped past her into the room.

"Geez, and I thought you had been lazy before you left!" Naruto complained good-naturedly as he walked up to the bed and pulled a chair up to the bedside.

"For the record, I would like to point out that this time it really wasn't my fault." The copy ninja answered.

Naruto snorted.

"I'm not talking about the coma, I'm talking about the six hours you slept for afterwards." He told him sarcastically. 

Kakashi smiled apologetically and glanced back over to where Sakura still stood in the doorway, a soft smile playing on her lips to match the softness in her eyes as she watched him.

Sasuke stood behind her and slipped his hand around her waist.


	22. That Comfortable Groove

Disclaimer: Naruto most certainly does not belong to me. 

A/N: Hey everyone, thank you so much for all the reviews you've been sending me, they make me so happy and want to write more ^-^

To Ashi-chan: About the coffee, personally I'm actually not that big of a coffee person. I react really strongly to the caffeine. I am however a tea addict ^^ I figured that Sasuke would probably be a coffee addict though which is why he's always drinking it until he's twitchy. 

Sailor Tiamat: I know its been a while since you've asked this and I'm sorry for the late response. I will attempt to draw Gaara, if it comes out well, I'll put it in my image gallery on mediaminer.org and attach it to the fic. 

Anyways, I hope you all enjoy. The next chapter should be up later tonight. Thanks again for the reviews and I can't wait to read more ^_~

~~~

The Butterfly: Chapter 22

By: Tea Leaf / Banana Soap

~~~

She didn't notice. She was too absorbed in the reality of the moment. There he was, alive and well, chatting with Naruto, Gai and Tsunade. Catching up on the two years he'd missed in the form of random anecdotes and political movements. 

Everything seemed to have this hazy glow around it, everything felt so surreal. 

Finally Tsunade looked at the clock and announced that it was currently 3 o'clock in the morning so she had to go home and get at least a little bit of rest. Naruto spazzed, remembering that Hinata would be at home alone and worried for him and about the operation so he had to go see her. Kakashi had smirked. Gai had declared he had to leave too, he had promised Lee some early morning training. 

She moved out of the doorway, allowing the three to pass as they all waved to Kakashi and promised to visit again the next day. She stayed. 

Sasuke got the distinct feeling that he was intruding again. 

She still hadn't moved towards him, she was still watching. 

Kakashi made slightly strained conversation with Sasuke, centering mainly on his work with ANBU until they couldn't really think of anything more to say and the silence stretched in the room.

She looked up at Sasuke. That uncomfortable feeling that had been growing in the pit of his stomach grew heavier still and he knew he had to leave. So he sighed and reluctantly took his leave telling her that he would leave the door unlocked.

She'd smiled at him and he'd left. 

The silence still stretched as she continued to simply look at him, that soft look still on her face, coloring her eyes and her small smile. 

He was comfortable just looking back at her. 

This was a common ritual for them; they didn't really need to talk and were perfectly comfortable just enjoying the other's presence.

Finally a grin broke across his face. "Yes, I am really here." He told her, guessing the cause of her dreamy look.

She blinked, then grinned, then laughed as she suddenly rushed him, jumping onto the bed and hugging him tightly.

"Welcome home." She said. 

He hugged her close, re-familiarizing himself with her texture, her weight, her scent. 

She leg go of him and sat back, still sitting on the bed with him.

"This is for you." She said as she handed him the package she'd been holding. 

He opened it. The first thing in the bag was a book, Come Come Paradise Volume 5. 

She grinned as he blinked at it and sweat dropped slightly. "Thanks." He said, half sarcastically.

She chuckled. He pulled the second thing out of the bag; it was a photo album.

 He looked at it questioningly.

"They're pictures I've been taking for the past few years of things I thought you might like to see." She said a little shyly. 

He lifted an eyebrow with curiosity as he opened the book and smiled slightly at the first picture. It was the one of team 7 after they had all passed the Jounin exams. The next few pages were photos of highlights from both Naruto's and Sasuke's battles.

"Why aren't there any of you?" he asked as he looked through the book.

She looked down.

"Everyone forfeited so I didn't have to fight. And even if I had, there wasn't anyone else to take the pictures." She answered him with a forced smile.

He frowned but let it go and continued turning the pages. More pictures of Naruto showing off some new skill. He continued to flip, pictures of Sasuke's try-outs for ANBU.

"How did you manage to watch the ANBU tryouts? Those are closed to the public." 

She smiled mischievously. "Tsunade helped me sneak in." 

He smiled slightly and continued to turn the pages, there were a few of various places that she said she had visited on missions. 

About halfway through the book though, those pictures ceased. He'd considered asking, but she'd looked a little strained so he let it pass. He continued to flip through; there were pictures of everyone but her. 

He flipped through to the end, enjoying her commentary for the various images. Finally he got to the last one and looked at it. It seemed familiar but different; he couldn't place why he recognized it.

"That's the view from the bar over the bridge that you always showed up on whenever we met there." She said softly. 

He smiled a little, only she would ever think of taking a photograph from that spot. 

He looked at it for a long time then closed the book and set it aside to look at her again. Her eyes were shadowed and she was watching him intently, as if expecting something from him.

He raised his eyebrow.

"You said you would tell me what had happened to you after you woke up." She reminded him.

He frowned. 

"When did I say that?" he asked, confused.

She frowned back.

"When I was unconscious…you came and told me I had to wake up and then I asked you what had happened to you and you said you would tell me after you had woken up." She said. 

He continued to frown, it was impossible that he had done any such thing but if she wanted to believe it, he'd let her. So he shrugged and leaned back against the pillows, attempting to stifle the yawn that crept up on him. He was so tired. He didn't have any stamina left at all, just talking with her and flipping pages in a book left him feeling drained. 

"You know what, you can tell me later." She said as she watched him force the yawn back. 

His lips twitched at the corners gratefully as she stood up.

"Going home?" he asked her.

She hesitated slightly.

"I am home." She answered, looking away from him, and turned off the lights before curling up in one of the chairs and watching him.

He patted the spot beside him in the bed. She uncurled herself and crawled under the covers, snuggling up to him, to his warmth. He was warm again. 

~~~

He stared at the ceiling. He was tired but he couldn't sleep. It was sunrise and she hadn't come back yet. 

He was sure she wasn't going to come back. 

~~~

And she didn't. Not that day, not the next, not the week after, not two weeks after. She didn't come back. 

He didn't see her. He hadn't gone to the hospital. She hadn't come to the house, sending a nurse instead to get some more clothing for her.

He was going out of his mind; he had to get away for a bit. 

So he threw himself on the "mercy" of the Hokage. She'd been in a vindictive mood, still stinging from him having skipped out on duty that day…

So she'd sent him on a particularly grueling mission that required espionage, assassination and diplomacy and would probably take him at least a month to complete.

~~~

It was amazing how quickly he was recovering. With only two weeks of physiotherapy and already he could walk around if he used a pair of crutches. He could also do five one-finger pushups with his own weight.

She had to laugh at him though, he was so frustrated. He thought he should be far more recovered than he was. 

She hadn't left his side in the past two weeks. She'd drowned out anything that had suggested she should. He needed her to be here and so she was. 

This was where she belonged; this was where she was supposed to be.

But still, deep down, she felt unsatisfied.

He glanced at her from the weight training equipment he was working with. She had that faraway look on her face again, that shadow in her eyes. 

He sighed, three years was a long time. She'd changed.

~~~

"Sakura, may I speak with you?" Tsunade asked from the doorway to the room. She looked up from her book then over at Kakashi who was still asleep and nodded. 

She stood up and moved into the hallway. 

"What is it?" she asked. 

"I just thought I should let you know that Kakashi is fit to return home, provided of course that you are to stay close and keep and eye on him and help him continue his physiotherapy." She began. "His old apartment has been reopened for him and his things that were in storage are being moved back there as we speak. Also, Sasuke has been sent on a mission and will be gone for the next month so I hope you have a key to his house so that you can collect the rest of your things." The older woman told her.

Her eyes stung slightly. __

_{He left?}_

She blinked and nodded.

"Yes, I do." She answered.

"Excellent, I suggest you gather your things now. I'll stay here with Kakashi," Tsunade told her before walking into the room. 

Sakura nodded numbly and walked down the hall towards the door as Tsunade settled herself in a chair and picked up the copy of Come Come Paradise, Volume 5 that had been on the table beside the bed and began to read.

~~~

Her feet were dragging. She didn't understand it. Why was she nervous about going to his house, especially if he wasn't even there?

Because he wasn't there.

She stood on the doorstep for a long time, just looking at the wood. 

Finally she sighed and reached into her pocket for the spare key he had given her and opened the door. 

The hall was dark and cold. The kitchen was immaculate. The stairs were silent as she walked up them. 

She went into the spare bedroom and gathered the few things she had left on the bed and shoved them into her old backpack. 

She looked around the room. It was like she'd never even been there.

She left and her feet turned against her will and took her into his room. 

The room was clean, the bed perfectly made. Like it always was. 

Her rebellious feet took her to the bed and she ran her hand over the dark blue comforter. 

She cast one last look around the room, her eyes frowning when she spotted a worn photograph on the table beside his bed. 

It was full of crease marks and water stained. She picked it up. It was the picture that had been taken of all four of them after he had returned to the village. 

She set it back down and turned, and ran, practically flying out of the empty house.

~~~

The move went smoothly and the month passed quickly and easily with very few points of interest. 

The only real event was Gaara returning home to introduce the now adopted Mika to his siblings. They hadn't said much to each other. Mika had still been afraid of her. 

She'd felt like the most horrible person on the planet. It hadn't been enough that her whole family had been killed because of her, she'd had to go and traumatize the child even more. 

She'd been half relieved that Gaara had been taking the little girl far far away from her influence. 

He hadn't really wanted to leave her, something had been off about her ever since that day she'd seen Mika hold the butterfly. But she hadn't opened up to him about what it was, he was pretty sure she wasn't consciously aware of the presence.

And so he'd left, returning to the desert, dragging a promise out of her that she would come to visit soon. 

The only really interesting bit of news had been Kakashi's report on the elimination of the Akatsuki. The long and short of it had been that a few members had tried to escape during the battle and he'd gone after them. He'd been outnumbered and overpowered. 

Just when he'd about to be killed, butterflies had flown out of nowhere and started landing on his opponents. They'd all been killed. 

A butterfly had landed on a cut on his arm and that was the last thing he'd remembered.

Gossip had spread that Sakura had sent the butterflies to protect him.

The truth was that they'd followed the scent of her blood on their own whim. The truth was that that was all they had ever done. The truth was that they had never been under her control. 

They still followed her every now and then, fluttering to a window ledge of Kakashi's apartment or following her around if she was in the woods. 

But still, it wasn't her they'd cared about. It was her blood. The one unique ability she'd had had been a fake all along. 

She'd ignored the numbness that had grown with the realization. The same numbness she'd been fighting off ever since she'd found out that Sasuke had left. She let herself drown in Kakashi's presence and recovery.

He was making amazing progress. He still wasn't able to really fight but he could walk on his own and even run for short periods of time and could now do 200 one-finger pushups on his own, and 30 with her as extra weight. 

He'd encouraged her to start training again as well and with the pressure of the promise she had made to Lee, she'd returned to honing her body for the sole purpose of standing around and looking pretty seeing as she had resigned as a jounin and Tsunade wouldn't send her on missions even if she hadn't. 

Lee still pretended to go all out with her but she could see straight through him. She didn't bother calling him out on it though; there was no point. 

And so life settled back into the familiar, remembered patterns of three years ago. But still, she felt something missing and she cursed him in the middle of the night when she still couldn't sleep even though Kakashi was with her. She cursed him when all she had to occupy her mind was worry for him. She cursed him when she could barely move past the weight of her heart when she became aware that he wasn't around her. 

She spent the month cursing him. She spent the month hating him for doing this to her again.  


	23. Sweet Mistakes

Disclaimer: No, even after all of this, I still don't own Naruto.

A/N: Well everyone, I'm sorry for the late update. Believe it or not, I hit some severe writer's block with this chapter. I'm still not sure it came out correctly. I think the ending is too easy. But I justify it in the fact that I think Sakura's personality is very obsessive and so the concept of simply letting go of whatever it was that had hurt her would never occur to her. 

Before I say this last bit, I would again like to think every single person who has read this fic, especially everyone who's left me the 156 reviews on FF.net, the 3 on MediaMiner and the 58 on AFF.net. You guys are awesome and you have no idea how much reading your comments, impressions, criticisms and praise have influenced me and encouraged me in the writing of this fic.

A special thank you goes to Sailor Tiamat, Lady Light, Empty Sanity, Jewel Song, Ashi-chan, Nocterayne and everyone else who's left me reviews for just about every chapter, as well as to Mint, Ivy, Fly, Wicked Innuendo, Fanartist, Kayoko and Aya for not only continually reviewing but also writing and corresponding with me directly as well as really, really helping me write and sort out my ideas for this fic. 

So thank you everyone, and I truly hope you enjoy this, the final chapter of The Butterfly. Oh, and the lyrics at the end are from the song "Sweet Mistakes" by Ellis Paul.

~~~  

The Butterfly: Chapter 23 

By: Tea Leaf / Banana Soap

~~~

He sighed as he watched her sit at the window. It was midnight on another sleepless night for her. The moonlight filtered in softly, casting an ethereal glow to her skin. A soft breeze blew through the open glass and fluttered the long strands of her hair. The curtain billowed, causing a teasing barrier between them. 

A physical equivalent to the ambiguous barrier that had been forming between them for the past month. 

She'd changed over the years. She wasn't the person she used to be. 

She was trying to be; there was no doubt about that. She was trying as hard as she could to fit herself back into the mold that had been so comfortable when they'd lived together. 

But it wasn't comfortable anymore. 

It was strained; it was shadowed. There were secrets now where there had been none before. There was a wall dividing them from their once open honesty. 

He smiled slightly; he wasn't surprised. He'd known it wouldn't last forever even if he had been able to stay. 

When it came right down to it, regardless of how much she may always want to deny it, there had always been something essential to her that had been missing.

He had been able to temporarily fill that void for her but that's all he was, filler. A substitution. 

He was sure she didn't realize that though, she wasn't the type of person who would consciously use someone. 

But even if she did…he couldn't really say that he'd minded. He'd probably been using her for the same purposes. 

But something had happened to her while he was away, something that made her realize that she simply couldn't patch up that void with anyone else. 

He sighed again, he'd been half hoping it wouldn't come to this but she'd been steadily regressing into herself. She'd been steadily sleeping less. She'd been steadily eating less. She'd been steadily disconnecting.

"Sakura" he said softly.

She looked at him, her empty gaze shifting from the window to him.

"Why are you here?" he asked her directly as he sat up.

"What do you mean?" she replied, frowning slightly.

"Answer." 

"Because…because I live here?" she responded hesitantly, still frowning.

He considered her answer.

"No you don't _live_ here, you haunt the halls like a ghost." He answered her in an honest tone, and she tried not to let the words sting too much.

"So, why are you here?" he asked again.

She glared at him, why was he doing this?

"Because…because you need me here." She answered, lifting her chin slightly in defiance.

He smiled slightly, this was one change he liked; her emotions were closer to the surface.

"Well, no, I don't. I did, that's true. But I can take care of myself again." He told painfully.

Her eyes stung and she looked away. 

"Why are you here?" 

"Because I have nowhere else to go…" she whispered.

"Now you're just strait out lying to me." He told her. 

"Are you telling me to leave?" she asked, her eyes still stung and her vision was becoming blurry; her throat hurt.

"No, I'd never tell you that. But it's obvious that here isn't where you really want to be so I'm wondering if maybe you should be somewhere else." He said gently as he watched her blink to clear her vision.

She didn't respond, she simply turned away and looked back out the window. Finally she stood up and went wordlessly to the door and left. 

She needed to clear her head.

~~~

He forced his feet to keep moving. He really didn't want to go back yet. He didn't want to be alone in that empty house. 

He couldn't stand it. 

It had been a rough month. He'd been grateful for the complication of the mission; it kept his mind occupied enough so that he could drown her out. 

But now…now he was back. Now she was too close for him to ignore her but to far to grasp her.

She hadn't come back. She wouldn't come back. He'd just been a replacement until that stupid perverted ex-sensei of theirs woke up. 

He almost wished she hadn't found him. But then he remembered that he couldn't really hate Kakashi, it wasn't his fault so he couldn't wish wasting away anonymously in some northern hospital upon him. But he could hate her. And he tried very hard to do so. 

He crossed the village walls easily, being recognized immediately by the guards, and continued to walk towards his house, his feet dragging.

It had been a mistake to get close to her. It was a mistake to have gone after her at all. It was a mistake to have let her leave in the first place.

~~~

She leaned against the rail of the bridge, letting the comfort of a familiarity that no one could take from her wash over her as she watched the fireflies dance over the moving water.

Damn Kakashi for seeing through her anyway. She'd been starting to be able to ignore it. She'd been starting to act normally again. She'd been starting to be able to force away the numbness during the day. 

She felt so stupid…there was another familiarity. She always felt stupid and useless. 

She wanted her butterflies back. Her butterflies had always been her companions; they'd made her feel strong and smart. 

But there were no more butterflies. They didn't come to her anymore. They weren't hers anymore. 

She sighed and sat down, her legs swinging over the edge of the bridge. 

She heard steps. She ignored them. Maybe she'd get lucky and it would be some psycho who'd simply murder her and put her out of her misery.

The owner of the steps sat down beside her, his own feet swinging over the edge as well.

No such luck. 

She couldn't say she was surprised he was there; it was just a perfect anecdote to the sick joke that had been her day, her week, her month, her year, her life. 

They didn't speak. Her inner self snorted, they never spoke. She stared listlessly at the fireflies. 

"How was your mission?" she asked him eventually.

"Successful." He answered her.

The silence stretched again.

"How's Kakashi?" he asked her.

"Good. Recovering remarkably quickly." She responded.

Again the silence stretched. 

"You ruined it, you know." She told him, so softly he could barely hear her.

He didn't respond.

"As soon as I found out you were gone…." She trailed off, her gaze hazy as she watched the fireflies. 

"As soon as you found out I was gone you what?" he pressed.

She took her time, deliberating her answer.

"I went numb." She said eventually. 

"Ah numbness…" was his response.

Silence fell again.

"You ruined it, you know." He told her, his voice barely above a whisper.

She frowned slightly.

"What could I have possibly ruined for you?" she asked, bristling slightly.

"You ruined my comfort zone." He told her quite matter of factly.

"Well then we're even on that front." She responded a little sharply.

"What are you mad at me for? I haven't done anything to you." He muttered.

"Excuse me? You haven't done anything to me?" she snapped as she whirled to glare at him.

"You abandoned me. Then you ignored me and avoided me. Then you dismissed me. And then you tricked me into caring about you again and again, you abandoned me!" she raged.

"What are you talking about, I didn't abandon you!" he shot back, glaring as well.

"What the hell do you call leaving without so much as a by-your-leave?" she said acidly.

"I had a mission." He responded, his own anger starting to rise.

"One you volunteered for." She continued, cutting it down. 

The brought him up short.

"How did you know that?" he asked, his eyes narrowing.

She looked away, back out at the fireflies.

"I asked about you." She said, her voice calm and quiet again.

He felt a small smile start to twist the corner of his lips.

"Where you worried about me?" he asked her.

"Of course I was worried about you, I've always worried about you." She answered as she stood up.

He looked up at her, frowning slightly.

"Really?" 

She glared and kicked him lightly in the ribs.

He winced. "That was uncalled for…" he muttered.

She moved to the opposite railing of the bridge. 

He stood up.

"Had you bothered to come back, I wouldn't have volunteered for that mission" he said as he leaned back against the railing and crossed his arms, looking at her back.

"Well excuse me if I had something important to take care of before crawling back to you like some lap dog. Besides, you could have and should have come to the hospital!" she shot back.

"Why didn't you come back?" he asked her pointedly.

"Because…because I got caught up. Because…I don't know. Why didn't you come to the hospital?" she countered.

"Because…I couldn't figure out what to say. Because I thought you didn't want me there." He answered as he looked away.

"Why would you ever think that?" she asked softly.

"Because you ignore me and avoid me." He answered a little childishly. 

She resisted the urge to hit him again.

"Why do you think I did that? Did you ever consider that I acted that way because you acted that way towards me? Because you had made it abundantly clear that you didn't want me around you?" she asked with a glare.

He didn't answer her. No, he hadn't thought of that. 

"I'm sorry." He said eventually.

She gripped the railing as a wave of …something washed through her and weakened her knees. She took a deep breath.

"I want to say apology accepted but I'm not sure I can that easily. So, I'm sorry too." She answered, still not looking at it.

He waited for the words to form in his mind.

"How about…we don't bother with forgiveness. Mistakes were made, we move on." He said eventually.

She considered. How simple. How easy. How could she have not thought of this before? 

Just let it go. 

Let the past go. 

Let the memories go. 

Let the butterflies go.

"Ok." She answered softly, finally raising her eyes to his. 

"Ok." She said again, as she felt the weight lift. Finally felt it lift.

"Ok." He answered. 

She smiled.

He smiled back.

~~~

_//Bless your sweet mistakes _

_That crumble you down to your knees_

_They brought you to this place,_

_Changing you by degrees_

_When change was just what you needed_

_Pop the cork, a champagne glass_

_Raise to the future, drink to the past_

_Thank the Lord for the friends you cast_

_In the play he wrote for you// _

_//…fin…//_


End file.
